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49
While Atterbury was talking on the phone, I
plugged the tape recorder in, rewound all the tape
onto one spool, then took it off the machine and
put it in my overnight bag.
He was just hanging up when I finished. And I
looked up.
"Anything?"
"They have offices in the World Trade Center.
But how did you know that?"
"I didn't," I said. "Call the number. I'll get Pat
out of bed." I had a feeling that whatever was
going to happen with Don, was going to happen
tonight. And I knew where it was going to happen,
even though it still didn't make any sense to me. It
was just too sloppy.
Pat was lying, fully clothed, on the bed, a light
cover thrown over her. I sat her up.
"Come on, Pat, wake up. It's me, Nick. Time to
wake up."
She opened her eyes and looked up at me.
"Nick?" she said thickly.
I pulled the cover back and undressed her.
' 'Nick?" she said, and she started to giggle.
When I had her clothes off, I carried her into the
bathroom, and while I propped her up in the show-
er, I turned on the cold water.
For just an instant, as the spray hit her, she
didn't react, but then she reared back with a shriek.
"What . . . God . .. What are you doing?" she
sputtered, trying to fight her way out of the tub.
But I held her there for several moments longer,
until finally I shut the water off and helped her out.
As I was drying her off, she put her arms around
me.
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"Nick?" she said. "Nick? Make love to me.
Nicky, please."
"Later, Pat. But now you've got to wake up. I
think I know where Don is. But you're going to
have to help."
"Don?" she mumbled. "Donny? You've found
Donny?"
"I think so," I said, tossing the towel aside.
Back in the bedroom I helped her get dressed,
and she gradually became more awake.
"You said you found Donny?" she asked.
"I think so," I said.
Atterbury came in, his face white. "There are po-
lice there. A police officer answered the tele-
phone."
"Jesus," I swore. "Is Don there?"
"I didn't ask," Atterbury said. "l just hung up."
"Is your car downstairs?"
"IR the garage," he said.
"GO down and get it right now. Pull around to
the front. We'll meet you there."
"Donny?" Pat mumbled.
"Move it!" I shouted.
Atterbury jerked as if he had been slapped. He
turned and raced out of the room. I heard him go
out the door, and then I turned and finished dress-
ing Pat.
I walked her into the living room where I
grabbed her coat and put it on her. And then prop-
ping her up by the door, I pulled on my coat,
grabbed my overnight case, and we left the apart-
ment, taking the elevator down to the lobby.
Atterbury was just pulling up in his Lincoln
Continental as Pat and I emerged from the build-
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ing, and he helped me get her in the front seat. I
climbed in next to her, and Atterbury got back in
behind the wheel.
For a moment he just sat there.
"Let's go," I shouted.
He looked at me, confused. "Where?"
"Jesus. The World Trade Center!" I couldn't be-
lieve it.
Atterbury pulled slowly away from the curb and
we headed downtown. There was something wrong
with the man, but I suppose I was too preoccupied
to really notice it. His complexion was definitely
pale, and there was a line of sweat on his upper lip.
All the way downtown, Pat kept mumbling
about her brother, but she wasn't making much
sense. I was almost certain now that the church had
been keeping Don at its headquarters here in New
York for at least the past couple of weeks, working
on him all the while. They had finally gotten him to
the point where he had made out his will, and now
he was going to commit suicide.
The cops being at the church's offices in the
World Trade Center clinched it for me. I only
hoped that we weren't too late
The street in front of the World Trade Center
twin towers was cordoned off when we arrived.
There were police everywhere, and as we came up
to the barriers, one of the traffic cops waved us
along.
Atterbury stopped the car and I jumped out.
"What's going on in there, officer?" I asked.
"Just move it along, will you?" the cop said,
tiredly.
"l have reason to believe that someone in there is
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NICK CARTER
attempting to commit suicide. I have his sister with
me," I said.
The cop stiffened, then looked over at the car.
"I'll tell them you're coming," he said, making his
decision. "They're on the eightieth floor in the
north tower. But you better hurry, he's put a desk
through the window and he's standing halfway
through the hole."
I jumped back in the car as the traffic cops were
moving the barriers aside. "Let's go. It's the north
tower. "
We pulled through the barriers and continued
down the street.
"He's here?" Atterbury asked.
"They said he was here?"
"The eightieth floor."
"Donny?" Pat asked, sitting up. She was starting
to come around.
Atterbury pulled up in front of the building, and
I helped Pat out of the car, across the walk and
through the front door. There were a dozen cops in
the lobby by the elevators.
A plain clothes cop broke away from the group
and hurried across to us. "Are you the ones related
to the guy on eighty?"
"This is his sister," I said.
"Let's go, let's go," he said hustling us to a wait-
ing elevator. We all stepped aboard the car; the
doors slid shut and we started up.
"How did you know he was here?" the cop
asked.
"It's a long story, which we'll tell you when this
is over with," I said.
The cop's eyes narrowed, and then he glanced at
Pat. "What's the matter with the sister?"




53
"Sleeping pills," I said. "She's not awake yet."
We made it to the eightieth floor in something
under a minute, and the detective hustled us down
a long corridor and through an unmarked door
that led to a huge suite of offices that were jammed
now with people.
"Is this them?" another plain clothes cop asked,
coming away from one of the inner doors.
"Is Donny here?" Pat cried out.
"Donald Staley?" the detective asked.
"That's him," I said. "What's the situation in
t h ere ?
"He came up here earlier this evening, threat-
ened some people here with a gun, then shoved a
desk out the window. He's hanging half in and half
out right now, threatening to jump."
"How about getting a rope on him from above?"
The cop shook his head. "Too much wind up
-there tonight. And two people have already died
trying to stop this character."
"Who?" 1 asked.
"A couple of people from the church that use
these offices. They tried to grab him, and they went
out the window with the desk. Another one of
them is in there now with our negotiator trying to
-talk him back."
Pat had listened to all this wide eyed, and she
pulled away from me, stepped around the detective
and went into the office.
"Donny?" she cried.
I was right behind her.
Don Staley was sitting on the floor of the large
office, one leg inside, and the other dangling over
the edge where the window had been. His hands




54
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NICK CARTER
were bloody from where he had been hanging onto
the shards of glass. The wind outside moaned at
the opening.
"Donny?" Pat cried again. She stepped past the
two men who had been talking with him.
"Don't gome any closer," Don screamed.
"It's me," Pat said. "Don, don't you recognize
me?" She continued toward him.
"No!" Don shrieked, and he rolled outward,
shoving himself away with his hands, and he was
gone.
"Don!" Pat screamed, and she leaped toward
the open window.
I was right after her, and just managed to grab
her at the last possible second and dragged her
farther back into the room. I didn't know if she
would have jumped after her brother, or if she even
knew what she was doing at that moment.
She screamed his name again, and then collapsed
in my arms sobbing as I led her out of the office.
Atterbury was standing there, staring wide eyed
at us. He was shaking.
The detective who had brought us up here, and
the one who had been here, came out of the office
shaking their heads.
I passed Pat over to Atterbury, "Get her back to
her own apartment, Stewart. "
"No," she cried. "I don't want to be alone, Nick.
Come with me please."
"I'll be there in a little while, Pat. Go ahead with
Stewart."
"Promise?" she said.
"I'll be there in just a little while," I said to her.
"Stay with her until I get there, will you, Stewart?"
Atterbury nodded.




55
C 'Hold up there," one of the detectives said.
"I'll give you everything you'll need," I said.
The cop turned on me. "She's his sister, so just
who the hell are you?"
"Nick Carter," I said. ' 'A friend of the family. I
work with Amalgamated Press and Wire Services
out of Washington, D.C., and I've been tracking
Donald Staley for some time now."
"Tracking him?"
"That's right. He's been missing for nearly a
month. He willed his fortune—fifty million—to
this church. And now he's dead. Right here from
the church's offices. "
The church official who had been inside trying to
talk Don out of jumping, glared at me, pure hate in
his eyes. But he said nothing.
The detective whistled. "All right, no one leaves
these offices until we get this story straight. And I
mean no one."









FIVE
A cold wind blew up the grassy slopes of the St.
Bernadette Cemetary on Long Island as the minister
was saying the final words for Donald Staley.
There were only a dozen people at the funeral
besides Pat, Stewart Atterbury and myself, but
among them was Michael Seidelman from The
Church of the Final Reward's Chicago head-
quarters.
He stood across the open grave from us, and ev-
ery now and then our eyes met. He was crying.
Don had leaped to his death three nights ago,
and the past seventy-two hours had been strange,
almost unreal. But the events of those three days
had proved beyond a doubt that the church had
destroyed Don, and that it was far more powerful
than any of us had ever imagined. So powerful, in
fact, that absolutely nothing had come of Donald's
death.
The church had been held totally blameless. Don
had been a basically unstable character, the
coroner's jury had ruled. The pressures of modern
society had led him to seek comfort within the
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church. But it had been too little too late.
His will, according to Atterbury, would be chal-
lenged, but he had admitted privately to me that
absolutely nothing would come of it. The church
would get his fortune.
Pat looked up at me, tears in her eyes, and I put
my arm around her shoulder and drew her a little
closer.
That night, after Don had killed himself, had
been a nightmare for her.
We had been questioned at the World Trade
Center for nearly two hours. During that time Pat
had let it slip that I was something more than just
a simple newsman from a wire service, and before
I could do a thing about it, I was searched.
A few eyebrows had risen when they came up
with my Luger, but the reaction had been hostile
when they found my stiletto.
One of the detectives had drawn his service re-
volver and pointed it at me. "Jesus H. Christ, we've
got ourselves a• walking arsenal here," he said.
' 'Cuff all three of them."
"You're making a mistake," I said, as the hand-
cuffs were being snapped on.
"We'll see about that downtown," the detective
had snapped, and we were taken directly to head-
quarters where we were separated.
I was fingerprinted and photographed, and then
strip-searched, both detectives nearly going
through the ceiling when my gas bomb was found.
"DO I get to make my one telephone call?" I
asked. This was going to have to be stopped before
it went too much farther.
"I'm inclined to say no," the cop said sharply,
58




58
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NICK CARTER
"but I'm curious as hell to find out who you're
going to call."
Still handcuffed, I was taken back upstairs to
one of the interrogation rooms where I was sat
down at a small table and given the use of a tele-
phone.
One of the detectives sat across from me with a
monitor earphone in one ear, and the other one
stood near the door watching me.
I dialed our Washington crises number, identi-
fied myself, and Hawk was on the line, his tone
guarded. The number I had called, and the pro-
cedure I had used, told him that I was in some kind
of serious trouble.
"Good evening, Nicholas," Hawk said. "Where
are you calling from?"
"Police headquarters in New York City. I'm un-
der arrest for carrying three illegal weapons, and
possibly for complicity in the death of Donald
Staley. I was at his apartment with Pat and the
Foundation's attorney, Stewart Atterbury. Did
anyone try to reach Pat there?"
"Yes, a friend of ours did. He was a little late,
but he did take care of everything."
I breathed a sigh of relief. Hawk had managed to
get someone up here to New York after all, and he
evidently found the mess I had left in the basement
heating plant room and had taken care of it.
"Thank you, sir," I said, and I hung up.
The detective across the table from me was
startled, and he opened his mouth to speak, but at
first nothing came out.
"May I have a cigarette while we wait?" I asked
pleasantly.
"What the hell was that all about?" the cop sput-
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59
tered, but then he turned to his partner. "Get
someone over to the Staley kid's apartment on the
double. Something is going on there."
I sat forward. "I'd wait on that one, for just a
few minutes," I said.
"What are you trying to pull, Carter, whoever
the hell you are?" the detective shouted.
"Staley was murdered," I said softly. "And I'm
trying to prove it."
"Bullshit! I saw him take a nose dive out the
window myself. "
"The Church of the Final Reward is a cult re-
ligion. They had control of Donald Staley for more
than a month, during which time they brainwashed
him into jumping out the window."
"Why would they do something like that?"
"Because Staley was a very rich young man. He
willed everything he owned to the church. And I've
got a hunch that they've done the same thing be-
fore with other people."
Both detectives stared at me for several seconds
until the one by the door came back to the table.
"You say you're a reporter with a wire service.
Why the fancy weapons?"
"I can't tell you that now," I said. "But within a
minute or so, someone will be walking through
that door with an explanation."
"l guess we'll just call your bluff, Carter," the
"I'll get his
cop said. He turned to his partner.
prints down to the FBI. They should be able to
come up with a make on him."
The door opened at that moment, and a tall,
husky man in a captain's uniform came in, fol-
lowed by another man in civilian clothes.
"Captain Parker," the detective seated across
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60
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NICK CARTER
I
from me said, jumping up.
"You're Nick Carter?" Parker asked.
I nodded.
"Get the cuffs off him," he snapped. One of the
detectives complied. "Mr. Carter, here, works for
the government. Is there anything we can do for
you?"
I got to my feet. The detectives were staring
open-mouthed at me. "l want Miss Staley and Mr.
Atterbury released and all records of this entire ac-
tion yanked from your files and destroyed."
The captain was nodding.
"For now, this never happened. Staley jumped
to his death, and that's the end of that as far as this
department is concerned. "
"Yes, sir," the captain said.
"Sorry," the detectives both mumbled.
I smiled. "Don't worry about it. You were just
doing your jobs. Now I want you to forget this ever
happened."
They nodded.
An hour later our clothing had been returned to
us, I had my weapons and my overnight bag back,
and Atterbury drove us uptown to Pat's apartment
where he dropped us off.
"They're going to be coming after his money
now," he said.
"See what you can do to stop it," I said. "Or at
least hold it up in court for as long as you can."
"Are you going after them?"
I nodded. "You're damned right I'm going after
them. They killed Don, and they tried to get to
me."
He looked at Pat, who was in a daze, shook his
head, and then drove off.
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61
I took Pat up to her apartment, put her in the
bathtub, then, while she was soaking, fixed us
something to eat.
She came out into the kitchen wearing a ter-
rycloth bathrobe and a towel around her hair just
as I was laying out the food on the counter. She
seemed much more awake, more herself now.
"Just like old times," she said, sitting up on one
of the stools.
"Coffee or brandy?" I asked.
"Both," she said.
I poured a couple of cups of coffee, adding bran-
dy to both, then brought them over to the counter
where I sat down across from her.
She cradled her cup in both hands and carefully
sipped at the hot brew. She was shaking.
she said after a moment.
"Why Donny?"
"Why'd they have to pick him,.Nick?"
"His money," I said.
She nodded. "It was a stupid question." She
carefully set her cup down and then shoved her
plate aside.
"You should eat something, Pat."
"The bastards," she said, the tears streaming
down her cheeks. "The dirty bastards."
I came around the counter, and she broke down
sobbing in my arms.
"Oh God, Nick, what am I going to do?"
I helped her off the stool and led her back to her
bedroom, where I threw the covers back on her bed
and laid her down.
As I started to straighten up, she grabbed my
arm and pulled me back. "Don't go, please don't
go. Stay here with me tonight."
"I'll just be in the living room."
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I
"No. I mean right here, Nick. In bed with me. I
need you tonight. I need you to make love to me."
"Pat .
"Please. I've never needed anyone more than I
need you right now."
I reached down and kissed her deeply on the lips,
her arms around my neck, and she drew me down
on top of her.
. oh God, Nicholas," she cried soft-
"Nicholas. .
ly.
When we parted, I got up, took off my clothes,
then came back to bed with her and helped her take
off her robe. We made love wildly and passion-
ately, her long legs wrapped around my body.
The next day I had remained in New York to
help Pat with the funeral arrangements for her
brother.
The day before, after first making sure that one
of our people would stick around to keep a very
tight watch on her, I had flown down to Washing-
ton, where I spent the day at AXE headquarters.
Hawk had opened a file on the Church of The
Final Reward, making it a legitimate assignment
for me.
"The Brazilian government has asked for our
help in this," he explained to me. "Unofficially, of
course, but they want to know whether or not the
church is legitimate. They- don't want another
Jonestown on their hands down there."
But despite a full day's work, using all the re-
sources of AXE, and therefore the CIA and FBI, I
was able to come up with very little else on the
church.
It was listed as a nonprofit organization, its
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63
funds being used entirely for the ministry. Spread-
ing the word.
The only thing I did learn was that the church's
founder and guiding spirit was a man by the name
of Franklin Knox. There was no file on him with
the bureau, and about all anyone knew was that he
had been born somewhere in Georgia, sometime in
the thirties, and had been a bible salesman until the
late sixties or early seventies when he had founded
his church in Atlanta. In 1972 he had moved his
operations up to Chicago.
I had returned to New York this morning, where
I had helped Pat and Atterbury with the final ar-
rangements, and now it was finished.
' 'Ashes to ashes, dust to dust," the minister in-
toned, ' 'we commend the soul of Donald Stearns
Staley to his maker, for life everlasting. Amen."
He sprinkled holy water on the open grave, then
on the casket, bowed his head for several long sec-
onds, and then came around to us.
"Miss Staley," he said. "There is hope for all of
us. You must understand that Donald is in a far
happier place now. He is at peace at last."
Pat was just nodding; she could not speak.
When the minister left, the other people came up
one by one, to offer their condolences, and I broke
away from them and went around the open grave
to where Seidelman was standing, hands together,
head bowed.
When I approached, he looked up. "Mr. Carter,
"That's right," I said.
"A tragedy. A terrible tragedy," he said. "He
was so young and innocent."
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NICK CARTER
"Probably the only truthful words you've
spoken," I said sharply. I reached in my coat
pocket and pulled out the identification cards I had
taken from Fordham in Chicago, and from the
man whom I had killed in the basement of
Donald's apartment building. I handed them over
to him. "I believe these belong to you," I said.
He took them from me, his eyes narrowing, and
put them in his pocket. "Leave well enough alone,"
he said softly, menacingly.
"I wonder what would happen if I took out my
gun and shot you dead here and now," I said.
He took a step backwards.
"Have you willed your worldly goods to the
church, Mr. Seidelman?"
"Of course," he said.
'C Then let me suggest you always keep a close
watch over your shoulder. You can never tell who
might be gaining on you." I turned and went back
to Pat and Atterbury and walked with them back
down the hill to the limousine.
"Who was that you were talking with?" At-
terbury asked.
"No one important," I said.
"I see," Atterbury said, glancing back at Seidel-
man who was still standing by Donald's grave.
We got in the limousine which took us farther
out on the Island to Atterbury's home near
Hampton Bays.
The afternoon went slowly. Many of Pat's
friends, and people from the Foundation who had
not attended the funeral, showed up to offer their
condolences.
The three of us had dinner alone around six-thir-
ty P.M., and then Pat and I left in her car around
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65
eight for the eighty mile drive back into the city.
I was leaving in the morning, and Pat wanted to
spend this last night alone with me. Three other
peopie from AXE would be coming up in the
morning to keep a very close watch on Pat here in
New York while I was gone, so I wasn't too wor-
ried about her I didn't think the church would try
anything against her anyway. Not this soon. And
they had no grudge against her in any event. It was
me they wanted. Especially after my little exchange
with Seidelman this afternoon.
It was late, sometime after two in the morning,
when I woke up aware of the fact that, for some
reason, we were no longer alone in the apartment.
Pat was cradled in my left arm, her lovely breasts
crushed against my chest, her long legs intertwined
with mine.
We had come back to her apartment early, had
finished a bottle of very good Dom Perignon, and
then had gone to bed where we had made slow,
gentle love to the strains of Tchaikovsky's violin
concerto.
We had fallen asleep in each other's arms, able at
least for that moment to forget the danger we were
both in, able for that moment to forget the terrible
image of her brother leaping to his death from the
eightieth floor of the World Trade Center.
Now they were back to finish what they had
begun, and lying naked here, I felt more vulnerable
than ever.
Slowly, so as to make absolutely no noise, I
moved myself away from Pat, disengaging my legs
from her and easing my arm from beneath her
head.
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66
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NICK CARTER
Whoever was in the apartment with us was
somewhere directly across the room. could hear
breathing and some other soft, scratching noise.
Every muscle in my body tensed as I made ready
to fling back the covers and leap up, but at that
moment a blinding light flashed in the corner, the
sudden sharp odor of sulphur wafted across to me ,
and something very sharp pierced my neck just
above my right shoulder.
"Nick?" Pat screamed as I leaped out of the bed
and stumbled to the floor as the covers twisted
around my legs.
A heavy, numb feeling began to spread rapidly
from my neck, down my shoulder, and through my
right side. I struggled to get up.
Flames suddenly sprung to life from a pile of
clothing and paper in the corner, and somehow I
managed to get unsteadily to my feet.
Two men were at the door; both of them were
tall and husky.
"He's up," one of them shouted, his voice com-
ing from a long way off.
"Never mind, Sid, let's get out of here," the oth-
er one said.
Sid. The name and the face swam around in my
fuzzy brain as I took several shaky steps forward,
finally collapsing near the chair where I had tossed
my clothes and my Luger in its shoulder holster.
I was fumbling for it when something slammed
into my face, snapping my head back, and I fell
over.
The man named Sid was standing over me, his
face garishly illuminated in the flames that were
rapidly filling the apartment.
"Die, pig," he said, and he laughed.
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RETREAT FOR DEATH
67
Through my haze, I heard the bedroom door
slam and then the door out into the corridor.
The bedroom was filled with choking smoke,
and it seemed to be spinning as I rolled over and
crawled back to the bed.
Pat's bare arm was hanging over the edge of the
bed. I grabbed it and pulled, rolling her off the bed
and on top of me on the floor.
She was only semi-conscious and couldn't help
me at all as I crawled, pulling her across the
bedroom to the door. I couldn't catch my breath,
and my heart was pounding nearly out of my chest
as I reached up with fumbling hands for the
doorknob, found it, and turned it.
The door came open, and I was able to pull Pat
out of the bedroom and into the large living room,
where•l stood up. I half carried and half dragged
her to the front door and out into the corridor.
Stumbling back into the apartment, I managed
to grab the telephone just inside the door and dial
the operator.
It was hard for me to make myself understood. It
seemed as if my tongue was too big for my mouth,
and I kept fumbling with the words.
But then she understood that there was a fire,
and somehow J gave her the address.
Smoke was pouring out of the bedroom now,
and flames were shooting out along the ceiling.
I dropped the phone and went back out into the
corridor where I managed to drag Pat another
twenty feet down the corridor, until I could not go
any farther, and I collapsed in a heap, the building
spinning, my head pounding.








SIX
I was vaguely aware that someone had come into
the corridor and was helping me to my feet, but I
was too far gone to know who it was or even care.
There were stairs, and then for a few brief mo-
ments I was intensely cold, until I was lying on
something soft, a blanket thrown over me.
It was quiet then for a long time, until the cold
came again, and Pat was lying next to me beneath
the blanket, and we were moving.
I was sure I heard sirens, and once I heard a
horn, but I was drifting, and although I heard these
things they meant nothing to me.
It was morning. "Ihe sun streamed through tall
windows across the room from the-four poster bed
that I was lying in.
For several minutes I was content to lie where I
was, warm and comfortable. But then a vision of
the fire and of the two men in Pat's apartment
came back to me in a rush, and I sat up with a start,
my head pounding.
Painfully I flipped back the covers and got out of
the bed. For a second or two I had to stand where
I was until the room stopped spinning, but then I
68
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69




69
stumbled across to a chair where clothing was laid
out for me.
Stewart Atterbury came in just as I was pulling
on a shirt. He seemed agitated.
"Thank God you're awake," he said, rushing
across the room to me.
"Where's Pat?"
"In the next room. She's all right. But she hasn't
come around yet."
"What the hell happened, Stewart?" I asked.
"How'd we get here?' :
"Some man came by with you. You were both
nude. We carried you in and put you to bed."
"Who was he?"
"He had a FBI identification. Said you were to
call your office as soon as you came around." At-
terbury looked at me. "He said you and Pat had
both been drugged. He said something about a
fire."
It must have been one of our people. The goons
that Seidelman had sent after us could have easily
gotten around him to us. Evidently he had spotted
the fire and had gotten us out of there.
"What happened? Was it the church?"
"You're damned right it was the church. They
tried to kill us last night."
' 'Good Lord," Atterbury said, backing up a
step. "Good Lord," he said again.
I was through playing games with these people.
If there had been even the slightest doubt lingering
at the back of my mind, it was completely gone
now.
"Is there a telephone here?" I asked looking
around.
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"On the desk," Atterbury said at the same mo-
ment I spotted it and went across the room.
"Can Pat stay here for a few days?" I asked.
"Of course," Atterbury said. "As long as she
wants."
"She may not want to stay here at all, but I want
you to keep her here until I return. Force her to
stay if you have to."
"Where are you going?"
I said. "l just have to
C' That doesn't matter,"
know that Pat will remain here."
"She will. I'll see to it," Atterbury said.
"Now if you'll leave me for a moment, I have a
call to make."
"Of course," Atterbury said, and he left the
room.
I dialed our Washington number and within a
few seconds I had Hawk on the line and explained
everything that had happened to us, including the
exchange between Seidelman and myself at Don's
funeral.
"I just now heard about it," Hawk said. ' 'Are
you and Miss Staley all right?"
"Aside from a headache, I'm fine," I said. "Pat
is still out."
"They're playing rough. "
"Yes, sir. Now it's time for us to return the fa-
vor. "
"What have you got in mind, Nick?"
"I'm going to pay another visit to church head-
quarters out in Chicago. An unannounced visit. I
want to see what their computer has to say about
all this. Should be interesting."
"Do you want the Bureau in on this?"
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71
"No," I said. "But you're going to have to side-
track any investigation here into the cause of the
fire. I want it kept quiet, at least for now."
"They're not too happy with us in New York
City since your arrest, but it can be done without
too much fuss."
I still had my watch. It read a few minutes after
eight A.M. "Have someone meet me at the Pan Am
ticket counter at LaGuardia with replacement
weapons for me. Mine were lost in the fire."
"I can have someone there by noon," Hawk
said.
' 'I'll need some clothes, money and a class IV
equipment inventory. "
Hawk said. "How about Miss
"All right,"
"She'll be staying here until I return. She'll be all
right, I think. I doubt if they'll try anything out
here. "
"We can have someone posted if need be."
"Probably not necessary, sir,"
I said. s 'I still
think they're after me and not Pat. Once I get out
of here she'll be okay."
"All right," Hawk said after a slight pause.
"Let's not underestimate these people any longer,
Nick. Be careful."
"Yes, sir," I said.
After I hung up, I went into the bathroom, took
a quick shower, shaved with the things there, then
got dressed again.
Pat was sleeping soundly when I checked on her,
and without disturbing her I backed out of the
room, softly closed the door and went downstairs.
Atterbury was waiting for me in the dining room
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I
with coffee and breakfast. He was dressed and
ready to leave for work.
"What staff have you got out here?" I asked as I
sat down at the table.
He poured me a cup of coffee and handed it
across. "A cook, housekeeper, and a groundsman
outside. "
"No one else?"
He shook his head.
"Do you trust them?"
"They've been with me for years. Of course I
trust them."
"Fine," I said sipping the coffee. "Where'd these
clothes I'm wearing come from?"
Atterbury hung his head. ' 'They were Donald's.
He and Pat came out here often. They both main-
tain wardrobes here."
"I see," I said. "I'm going to ride back into
town with you this morning. I'll return the clothes
later.
Atterbury waved it off. "Are you returning to
Washington?"
"Not immediately," I said. "There are a couple
of things I have to look into first."
"What about the fire investigation? If we could
prove that the church tried to kill you and Patricia,
it might help open up a line of questioning about
Donald's suicide."
"There'll be no fire investigation. At least none
for the moment. I just want you to continue doing
everything you can to stall the proceedings over
Don's will."
Atterbury shrugged. "That could be stalled for
months. Perhaps even a year or more."
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"All I need is a few days," I said.
73
Atterbury looked sharply at me. "What are you
going to do?"
"Just a little investigative reporting," I said.
He started to say something, but then clamped it
off.
After we ate breakfast, I checked on Pat again.
She was still sleeping peacefully. Then I went out-
side and got in the car with Atterbury. Immediately
his chauffeur pulled away from the house and
headed into Manhattan.
"Where do you want to be dropped off, Nick?"
Atterbury asked after we had ridden in silence for
a few minutes.
' 'Anywhere uptown," I said absently. I was
thinking at that moment of the blank look on
Donald Staley's face just before he leapt to his
death. It was a look so totally devoid of real human
emotion, that at that moment he could have been
nothing more than a department store manikin. It
was an impression that would remain with me for
a very long time to come, made more harsh by the
fact that the church had produced that effect in
him.
Atterbury dropped me off at Fifty-Seventh and
Fifth a few minutes after ten A.M.
"Don't say anything about Pat's whereabouts to
anyone at the Foundation," I said, standing by the
open door.
Atterbury looked startled. "Do you think some-
one at the Foundation will tell the church of her
whereabouts?"
"It's possible," I said. "Just don't say anything
to anyone, at least for the time being."
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"Whatever you say, Nick," Atterbury said, trou-
bled.
I closed the door and watched until the limou-
sine was out of sight; then I hailed a cab, instruct-
ing the driver to take me out to LaGuardia Air-
port.
All the way out to the airport, I kept glancing
over my shoulder out the rear window, but as far as
I could tell I wasn't being followed.
At the airport I entered the terminal at the
American Airlines area, then walked back up to
the Pan Am ticket area and took a seat where I
could watch the counter, the front doors, and the
main corridor.
The church had made a couple of mistakes with
me. This time they would be on their toes. So
would I. But I didn't think they'd expect me to
show up in Chicago. Not thus isoon, and not
alone.
For the next hour or so I watched the airline pas-
sengers coming and going through the terminal,
and as far as I could teli no one was paying much
attention to me.
About one minute before noon, a tall, black
man, carrying a suitcase and an overnight bag,
came down the corridor, turned into the Pan Am
terminal area and stopped.
He spotted me almost immediately, and he came
over, set the bags down, then turned and walked
off.
I waited for another ten minutes, then non-
chalantly got up, picked up the bags, and left the
Pan Am area, entering one of the small cocktail
lounges halfway across the terminal.
I sat down at one of the tables, bought myself a
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5
bourbon and water, and then opened the overnight
case. Right on top were my airline tickets on Re-
public, leaving for Chicago at one-thirty P.M., and
beneath that was a large portable radio/cassette
pkyer which contained, I knew, my weapons.
An envelope with the tickets contained a number
of credit cards in my own name, and several hun-
dred dollars in cash, as well as a battered wallet.
I pocketed the tickets, the wallet and the money,
leisurely finished my drink, then went over to the
Republic Airlines gate area. I went through the se-
curity check and then walked down to the gate to
wait for my flight.
It was ten below zero, and a raw wind was blow-
ing when we landed at O'Hare. I retrieved my suit-
case and took a shuttle bus over to the Airport
Hyatt Regency where I checked in, and was given
a room on the fifth floor.
I quickly showered, shaved again, and changed
into my own clothes, strapping on my weapons.
AXE's equipment specialists had packed a civil-
ian parka for me, along with the gear I had re-
quested, anticipating that I might have to spend
some time outside in this weather.
I stuffed the few pieces of equipment in the inner
and outer pockets of the coat, then left my room,
setting up a telltale high on the door, near the
hinge, so that if anyone entered my room while I
was gone, I would know about it.
I went downstairs and had a quick bite to eat in
the dining room, then took a cab downtown, cruis-
ing slowly past thechurch's headquarters building
before instructing the cabby to drop me off two
blocks later.
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I paid him, then headed back on foot.
As I had remembered from the last time here, the
building next to the church's was a seven story de-
partment store. The two buildings abutted each
other, and if I could get to the roof of the depart-
ment store, without being detected, sometime after
dark, I figured I had a very good chance of getting
into the church's building without tripping any
alarms.
I hurried past the church building, averting my
face so that there would be no chance of me being
spotted and recognized if someone was posted at
the front doors, then went into the department
store.
A sign on a metal rack just inside the front doors
listed the store's hours: Open nineA.M. tofive-thirty
P.M.
It was just four-thirty now, which gave me an
hour to get in place before the last few shoppers
left.
The department store was busy with shoppers, as
I threaded my way toward the elevators at the back
of the building.
Only the first five floors were open to the public.
The sixth and seventh contained offices.
I rode the elevator up to the fifth floor, which
was not quite as busy as the ground floor, and
when I was reasonably certain that no one was
paying me any attention, I slipped out the exit door
to the stairwell.
A small glass window was set in the steel door
just about eye height, and I looked through it wait-
ing to see if anyone had spotted me and was com-
ing to investigate.
But after a minute or two when no one came, I
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77
turned and hurried up the stairs to the sixth floor
where I looked through the window into a large,
open room filled with dozens of people busy at
desks.
Continuing up to the seventh floor, I again
glanced through the window. This floor contained
a plushly carpeted corridor, with paintings hanging
on the walls. The executive suite.
About twenty feet down the corridor a man
stood waiting for the elevator. The doors opened,
and he stepped on and was gone.
The stairs continued up, ending at a windowless
steel door with an alarmed trip lock. The door
would open, but when it did an alarm would sound
throughout the building, unless the trip lock was
deactivated with a key.
Quickly I slipped out my stiletto, and getting
down on my knees, I began working on the lock. It
was a fairly simple cylinder type, and within a half
a minute I had the five pins depressed, and the plug
turned.
I straightened up, leaving the stiletto in the lock,
and pushed the locking bar forward. It stuck for a
moment, but then popped open with a loud snap,
and the door swung open.
The alarm did not sound. I stepped half outside
into the intensely cold, biting wind, and looked
across the roof at the church's building which rose
another fourteen stories.
It was already starting to get dark out, and most
of the windows in the church building were lit up.
From where I stood I could even see people seated
at desks a few floors up.
If I was spotted coming out of the stairwell, there
was a possibility that fact might be mentioned to
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I
someone. But there was no other way. I could not
remain there in the stairwell until everyone next
door had gone for the night. The department store
night guards would be almost certain to check this
door.
Back inside, with the door still open, I reset the
locking bar, checked to make sure there wasn't a
secondary alarm trip on the latch itself in the door
frame, and then reset the alarm switch, removing
my stiletto from the lock.
Still no alarm sounded, and a moment later I
had slipped outside and had carefully reclosed the
door.
No matter what happened now, I would not be
able to return the same way I had come. There was
no way of deactivating the alarm from outside, nor
was there any simple way of opening the door.
Keeping low, and in the shadows as much as
possible, I hurried across the roof to the air condi-
tioning units housed in their own utility room. The
door lock was another simple cylinder lock, and I
had it opened in less than a minute and slipped in-
side, closing the door behind me.
Two huge air conditioning units filled most of
the space inside. On three walls were louvered
vents which hinged outwards, and by inserting my
stiletto in one of the slots and pushing all the way
out, I could just look outside and see a few floors
of the church building to the left, and the exit door
of the department store to my right.
I wedged the blade in place so that the vent re-
mained open, then stepped back away from the
opening and lit myself a cigarette.
All that had taken me only fifteen minutes, so it
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79
was still not even five o'clock yet. The store closed
at five-thirty, and it would be at least an hour after
that before the night watchmen over there finished
their initial rounds and settled down for the night
with their first cup of coffee.
There was no telling, however, just how long the
church employees would remain in their offices, al-
though I suspected most of them would be quitting
and gone for the night no later than six.
I would have to give it several more hours, just
to make sure that no stragglers remained behind.
Sometime between nine and ten, I figured. Four to
five hours from now. It was going to be a long, cold
wait up here in this unheated building.
A few minutes after six the department store exit
door opened, and an older man in a dark uniform,
carrying a flashlight and a large ring of keys,
stepped halfway out onto the roof.
He shined his light around, flashed it past the air
conditioning building where I was watching from,
shivered, and then went back inside, closing the
door after him.
About the same time, the lights in the church
building began going out, starting mostly with the
lower floors, the pattern gradually working itself
upwards as the higher ranking executives finished
their last minute work for the day.
The windows on the sixteenth floor, which con-
tained the computer room, were blocked off, so
there was no way of telling from here what was
happening up there. It was a safe bet, however, that
the lights were never turned out on that floor. The
computers would be running twenty-four hours a
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day, hopefully with only a skeleton crew at night.
By eight-thirty, all the lights, except for a few
windows on the top floor, had been turned off.
And by nine-thirty, even those last few windows
went dark, and I got ready to go to work.
I was freezing, so that when I retrieved my stilet-
to and stepped out onto the roof, the bitterly cold
wind that was blowing didn't seem much worse
than inside.
I quickly crossed the department store roof to
the side of the church building. The eighth floor
windows were about five feet above the level of the
roof on which I stood, and I peered through one of
them into a small office that contained two desks.
A map of the west coast, from California all the
way up to Alaska, was pinned to the wall, markers
at various cities, with a large cluster of colored pins
in and around the Los Angeles area.
Glancing over my shoulder to make sure no one
was at the department store exit door, I pulled the
glass cutter and putty I had been supplied with out
of my parka pocket and set to work cutting a fist-
sized hole in the window just above the latch.
Before I had cut a complete circle, I laid a thick
strip of putty on the glass, then finished with the
cutter.
The section broke away cleanly, with only a
small cracking noise, and I pulled it out with the
putty attached.
As far as I could tell, the window was not wired,
and within seconds I unsnapped the latch, raised
the window, and climbed inside.
I reclosed the window, scraped the putty off the
small, circular piece of glass, then ran a narrow
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81
bead of putty around the edge, and carefully stuck
the glass back in place before closing the curtains.
There would be no telltale cold breeze coming
through the hole in the window for someone to dis-
cover if they opened this door.
At the office door, I put my ear to the wood, but
there were no sounds from the corridor, and I
opened the door a crack.
The corridor was deserted. I slipped out of the
office and hurried down to the stairwell door and
started up, taking the stairs two at a time.
At the sixteenth floor I stopped and put my ear
to the metal door. Faintly I could hear the sounds
of people talking and of machinery running.
I inspected the hinge line of the door with my
penlight, and near the top I could see that it was
insulated from the metal frame. This door was
alarmed, as I had expected it would be. But there
were people talking on the other side. Several peo-
ple.
This wasn't going to be as easy as I had first
hoped it would be. But still not impossible.
I turned away from the door and continued up
the stairs where at the nineteenth floor I slipped
the simple catch latch with one of my credit cards
and stepped into the carpeted corridor.
The lighting was subdued and the floor ap-
parently deserted. I hurried down the corridor to
the secretary's desk just across from the elevator.
The indicator above the door showed that the
car was down on the ground floor. And keeping
one eye on it, I sat down at the secretary's desk and
opened drawers until I found what I was looking
for, the building's telephone directory.
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There was no listing under computer or termi-
nal, but under the listing, records, there were sever-
al names and three digit telephone numbers,
among them a number for George Stevenson, sec-
ond shift duty operator.
I cleared my throat, then picked up the tele-
phone and dialed the number.
It was answered on the third ring. "Records," a
man said.
"That you Stevenson?" I said, and I coughed.
'EThis is Stevenson. "
"Larry and I have a bit of a problem up here.
Come on up right away, and bring the operational
manual with you."
"Yes, sir," Stevenson said, hesitating. "Ah
who is this?"
"You idiot," I snapped. "This is Seidelman," I
coughed again.
"Sorry, sir, didn't recognize your voice with
your cold. Be right up."
I hung up the phone, unzippered my parka, and
pulled out my Luger.
From this point on, there would be no doubt in
anyone's mind what I was up to here. And after
tonight a multi-national corporation's assets would
be brought to bear in an effort to stop me.
It wasn't going to be a picnic, but Seidelman,
Karsten and the head of the entire show, the Rev-
erend Franklin Knox, were going to be in for a few
surprises.










SEVEN
A few minutes later the elevator started up from
the first floor, stopping for about ten seconds at the
sixteenth, before continuing up.
I got up and stepped farther back into the
secretary's alcove, so that I was standing in the
shadows just behind a couple of filing cabinets.
The elevator door opened, and a tall, rotund
man who had to weigh at least three hundred
pounds stepped off and turned down the corridor.
I waited until the elevator doors closed before I
stepped out from behind the file cabinets.
"George," I called softly.
The man was halfway down the corridor, and he
spun on his heel and started back before he realized
that something was wrong. He stopped in his
tracks.
I raised my Luger. "Come on, George. I won't
hurt you if you cooperate with me."
"Who the hell are you . . ." he started to say, but
then recognition dawned in his eyes. "You," he
hissed.
The word had evidently gotten around. "That's
right," I said, smiling. ' 'So you know I'll kill you
84
83



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NICK CARTER
unless you do exactly as I tell you." That was a
bluff. I had no intention of killing this man; what
was happening here with the church wasn't his
fault, as far as I knew.
"What do you want?"
"Come on down here and let's take a look at
that operational manuaL"
At first he didn't move. But then I reached up
with my left hand and snapped a round into the
Luger's firing chamber, the noise loud in the quiet
corridor, and he came the rest of the way.
I stepped aside, closer to the elevator.
"Put the book down on the desk and open it to
data recall. "
"What level?" he asked automatically.
"I want a membership list."
He blanched. 6' That could take some time.
There's tens of thousands of members."
"I want the real membership list, George," I
said. "You know the one I'm talking about."
He started to shake his head, but I motioned him
toward the desk with the Luger. He moved over
and set the book down.
"I want a list of members who've already signed
wills leaving what they own to the church."
"What are you talking about?" he said. He
seemed sincere.
I glanced over my shoulder at the elevator in-
dicator. The car was still here on the nineteenth
floor. "Who else is down in records at this mo-
"No one," he said. This time he was obviously
lying. I could see it in his eyes.
"l heard other people talking, George. Who else
is down there?"
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85
"Two operators," he said. "Both of them key
punch girls."
' 'No security people?"
He shook his head. "They're down on six and up
on twenty-one . . ." he started, but then he realized
his error.
I reached behind me and punched the elevator
button. The door opened immediately.
"Bring the book, we're going downstairs," I
said, backing into the elevator and holding the
door with my free hand.
Stevenson hesitated a moment.
"Let's go, George, I'm beginning to run out of
patience with you, and we've still got a lot to do."
He gathered up the book and slowly came for-
ward, stepping into the elevator as I backed up. He
hit the button for the sixteenth floor, and we
started down.
"There are some people .
good people .
who've made out their wills to the church. But I
can tell you right now, there aren't very many of
them."
"Fine," I said. "Then it shouldn't take us very
long. "
The elevator door opened on the computer
room, and we stepped off.
A young woman was seated at a key punch ma-
chine a few feet away. She glanced up, and then did
a double take, her mouth opening to say some-
thing.
"Up off that chair," I said softly. "Now!"
She saw my gun, her eyes went wide, and she got
up.
"Where's the other one?" I snapped.
"l don't know," Stevenson said.
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I
"Cindy had to go to the bathroom," the woman
said. "She'll be right back."
Another young woman appeared from the back
of the room and came toward us. She could see
that I was here, but she apparently could not tell
that something was wrong. She was smiling.
"Come on over here, Cindy," I called to her.
She looked puzzled, but she came the rest of the
way, finally spotting my gun, and she stopped, her
right hand coming to her mouth.
"Anyone else on this floor?"
The first girl shook her head.
"Fine," I said. "Now I want you all to listen very
carefully. If you all do exactly as I tell you, no one
will get hurt, and I'll be gone as soon as I get what
I came for."
"Oh God," Cindy whimpered.
"The main terminal is over this way," Stevenson
said, motioning toward the center of the room.
"But you're on a wild goose chase."
"We'll let the computer tell me that," I said. "All
right, let's get started."
The two women preceded Stevenson and me
around several rows of data punch units to a semi-
circular grouping of equipment that was obviously
the computer's main terminal and control center.
There were half a dozen tape and disk memory
drives to one side, a key punch card sorter and a
hard copy printer to the other.
I motioned for the women to have a seat in the
center of the area, away from the controls.
"Either of you moves from your chair, or you
make any motion whatsoever to sound an alarm,
and I will shoot George here first," I said.
They hastily pulled chairs over and sat down,
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their hands folded in their laps.
87
"Now, George, I want you to open the opera-
tional manual to the data search and recall sec-
tion," I said. s 'I wouldn't want you to push the
wrong buttons."
He did as I asked, laying the book on the con-
sole, then moving away from it to the terminal con-
trol keyboard.
"I won't do anything to alert our security peo-
ple," Stevenson said. "I want you to believe that."
"l want to believe it, George. All I want is my
list, with addresses, and then I'll be off."
I glanced at the recall instructions, which were
laid out in tabular form indicating the sequence of
keys to punch for a desired output.
When I looked up, Stevenson had already
brought up the query circuit, the words: STAND-
BY FOR PROGRAMMING DATA appearing
on the wide CRT display.
He looked over at me. "Can I go ahead?"
I nodded.
His fingers flashed over the keyboard, the CRT
coming to life.
88
OPEN
SEARCH AND RECALL
DISPLAY HARD COPY
MEMBERSHIP LIST
SUB CLASS—MEMBERSHIP,
LIVE, WILLS TO
COTFR.
ANNOTATED SUB-LIST—
PROVIDING CURRENT
ADDRESSES.
START





88
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NICK CARTER
A red light winked on the top of the terminal and
Stevenson seemed startled.
"What is it?" I asked softly.
€61 don't know yet," he said shaking his head. He
punched a number of other keys in rapid
succession, and the red light went out.
RESTRICTED DATA
IDENTIFY
1
ILe reached for the keyboard.
"Hold it,"
I snapped.
He looked up.
"That will be information you'd not have access
to," I said. "Have you got a personal identifier, or
is that accomplished within the computer by name
only?"
"Personal identifier," Stevenson said.
' 'Do you know Seidelman's code?"
George shook his head, but one of the girls sat
forward. "l do," she said.
"Give it to George then. Seidelman is going to
request the list," I said.
Stevenson punched the seven unit alpha-numeric
code into the machine, and moments later the hard
copy printer began spitting out names and
addresses.
At first George just idly watched the machine,
but as it gradually became evident that even this
sub-list was going to be long, his eyes widened.
"What the hell . . . " he started.
"Think about it, George I said stepping closer
to the printer.
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He looked up.
89
' 'You have Seidelman's Identifier. After I'm
one, ask the computer to tell you the names of the
•hurch members who have already died and left
heir money to the church. The list will be long."
He was shaking his head. "There's something
wrong here. There has to be some kind of a
istake. "
"There's a mistake, all right. And I'm trying to
it."
The wide computer paper, filled with names and
ddresses, came out of the printer sheet after sheet,
olding itself into a hopper.
It took nearly twenty minutes before the
machine finally fell silent. George wound the last
sheet out of the printer, then pulled the stack out of
he hopper. It was at least four inches thick.
"There has to be a couple of thousand names
ere," he said in awe.
"That's right, George. And I'll •tell you
omething else. Everyone on that list is in mortal
anger right now."
"From what?" he asked innocently.
"From the church," I said. "Now put the lßt
own on the console, and step away from it."
He shook his head and backed up. I was afraid
f that. I did not want to hurt him, but I'd have to
Sf there was no other way.
"I sincerely don't want to hurt you," I said.
i' Give him the list," Cindy said. George looked
t her. "If what he says is true, then he can help. If
t's not true, then giving him the list won't hurt a
hinge"
Stevenson stood there indecisively for several
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seconds, until finally he set the list down on the
computer console, then stepped back away from it.
I grabbed the bulky list, folded it over as best I
could and stuffed it inside my parka.
"We're going down the stairs, together."
"Where are you taking us?" Cindy asked,
frightened.
"Just halfway down, and then I'll let you three
come back up here. By the time you'd be able to get
to a phone and sound the alarm, I'll be long gone,"
I said. "I haven't hurt you so far. I won't now, if
you cooperate with me just a little longer. Then
you can do whatever you want."
The girls got up from their chairs. George
nodded his assent, and we all crossed the computer
terminal room, entered the stairwell, and started
down.
Our footsteps echoed hollowly as we descended
from the sixteenth floor, but no one said a thing
until we reached the eighth.
"Hold up here," I said.
Stevenson and the women stopped and looked at
' 'You three can go back up now. I go down the
rest of the way by myself."
Without a word, they turned around and started
back up. At the first landing Stevenson looked
back down at me, shook his head, and then
disappeared from view.
I remained on the eighth floor landing for a
couple of minutes listening to them, and then I
opened the stairwell door and stepped into the
corridor.
I hurried down to the office I had entered the
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building from, slipped inside, and threw the
curtains back.
The window opened easily, and I slipped
outside, jumping lightly to the roof of the
department store five feet below.
Turning back and reaching up; I closed the
window and then raced across the roof. As I ran I
reached inside my parka and withdrew the coil of
thin, but incredibly strong nylon line, and friction
shackles AXE had supplied in my entry and search
kit.
At the rear of the building there was a three-foot
lip. I looked over the edge. Below was the
department store's loading dock, a snow clogged
alley running both ways to the streets.
I tied one end of the line in a large loop and
brought it back to the vent pipe, looping it over the
cap so that it could not slide up and off.
Back at the edge, I looked over once again. The
loading dock was lit by a night light, but there was
no activity down there, seventy feet below.
I flipped the free end of the line over the edge,
attached the friction shackles, and was about to
swing my legs over the edge when a shot
ricocheted off the brickwork inches away.
Spinning around, I dropped low and to the left
as I grabbed my Luger which I had stuffed in a
parka pocket.
A second shot was fired, going high and to the
right, the flash coming from a window far above on
the twenty-first floor.
I scrambled back to the right as a third shot rang
out, and I fired four shots in quick succession, at
least one of them breaking the window pane above
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where the flash had come from.
I had just run out of time. Stevenson and the
girls had evidently used a phone just a few floors
up from me, and the security people, knowing what
I was probably going to do, were trying to pin me
down here until they could get someone below.
I fired two more shots at the window, then
grabbed the friction shackles and literally jumped
over the edge, a near miss from above plucking at
my parka sleeve.
The shackles brought me up short about ten feet
down, the sudden shock nearly pulling my
shoulders out of joint. But then I was sliding down
the line in a rapid but controlled descent, using my
feet and legs as shock absorbers against the side of
the building.
Down on the loading dock, I released the line,
leaped down to the alley, and headed in a dead run
toward the street.
At the corner a half a dozen shots were fired at
me from the rear of the church building, but then I
was out on the streetl
I skipped quickly to the other side, raced to the
end of the block, skidded around the corner, and a
half a block later managed to grab a cab, directing
him to take me out to the Airport Hyatt Regency
on the double.
"Well, you're sure dressed for this weather," the
cabby said, conversationally.
"You bet," I replied looking over my shoulder.
Three burly men had just come around the corner,
and they stopped, looking directly at me in the cab.
Within five minutes they'd be on their way out to
the airport, expecting I'd be going there in an
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attempt to escape. It wouldn't take them very long
o discover that I was staying at the Hyatt. It was
going to be tight.
The cabby talked to me about the weather all the
ay out to the hotel. When he dropped me off, I
tossed a twenty dollar bill over the seat, told him to
keep the change, and hurried into the hotel, taking
the elevator immediately up to the fifth floor.
My little telltale on the door was still in place,
and I went into my room, grabbed my overnight
case and suitcase, and went back down to the lobby
here I paid my bill and hurried out the back way
through the restaurant.
O'Hare Airport would be out. They'd be waiting
there for me. And although I figured I would be
able to fight my way out of almost anything they
threw at me, I didn't want to take the risk of an
innocent bystander getting in the line of fire.
I walked around the back of the building to
where the driveway out front curved around and
merged with the highway.
From here I could see the front entrance to the
hotel. A cab had just pulled up and discharged four
large men in topcoats. They hurried into the hotel,
and the cab started my way. Empty.
I stepped out from the side of the building and
flagged him down. Tossing my bags in the back
seat, I climbed in.
"Where to, buddy?" the cabby asked, pulling
away from the curb.
"Milwaukee," I said.
"Milwaukee?" the cabby asked, looking at me in
the rear view mirror. "That'll cost you sixty
bucks."
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I
"Fine," I said. I pulled a hundred dollar bill out
of my pocket and handed it over to him. "I don't
want to take all night."
"Yes, sir," he said, straightening up in his seat,
and we shot out onto the freeway and headed north
for the fifty-mile drive.
I stayed the night at the Marc Plaza downtown,
and in the morning took the first flight out to New
York City, arriving a little after eleven A.M.
I telephoned Hawk in Washington from the
airport and told him what had happened in
Chicago, and about the list I had brought back
with me.
During the flight I had looked through some of
the many pages of names and addresses. The
heaviest concentrations were women, most of them
on the east and west coasts, as well as a few bigger
cities in the midwest, such as Chicago, St. Louis,
and Kansas City,
"It amounts to a death list," I told Hawk.
"We'll turn it over to the Bureau as soon as you
get back," he said.
"I'm going out to pick up Pat now," I said.
"We'll be driving down to Washington this
afternoon."
"I see," Hawk said.
"I'll want her put up in a safehouse somewhere,
until this blows over."
"Of course, Nick. But what about the church
I was suddenly tired of the entire affair. I had
come up with the hit list, something the Bureau
could not have done on its own. It would be up to
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them now to talk to each of the several thousand
people and gather enough evidence to prove that
the church was indeed trying to brainwash them
into not only leaving their money to the church,
but into ultimately committing suicide.
"There should be enough in this list to bring to
thc Justice Department," I said. "They won't cover
this up."
"Fine," Hawk said. "It looks as if I'll have
another assignment for you within a few days in
any event. Once you get back, you can get started
on your briefing."
"Anything you can tell me right now?"
"No, but you'll need your tuxedo."
"Yes, sir," I said, and I hung up.
I rented a car at the Avis counter, and twenty
minutes later I was heading east through Queens
toward Atterbury's home near Hampton Bays.











EIGHT
All the way out to Long Island, I kept thinking
about Pat and how I was going to explain to her
that I was passing the investigation of the church
and of her brother's death over to the FBI.
She wasn't going to take it very well. When she
had come to me in Washington and asked for my
help, I had promised her that everything would
work out all right.
The opposite had happened so far. Her brother
was dead. She and I had almost been killed. And
the church continued to operate.
I shook my head in exasperation. This had all
been so crazy. So meaningless. The church, as it
turned out, was nothing more than a cleverly con-
ceived scam to bilk innocent people out of their life
savings. Seidelman, Karsten, and the others like
them, were nothing more than high class con men
who worked under the guise of their religion.
It definitely was not a job for AXE, although I
did wonder what the hell the church used all its
money for.
A light snow had begun to fall by the time I
turned off the highway and continued down the
long gravel driveway into Atterbury's home. The
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97
trees were bare, and with the snow and wind, the
place seemed isolated, and deserted.
I didn't plan on remaining here for the night on
the off chance that the church would somehow
trace me here and try something. Parking the car in
front, I went up on the wide porch and rang the
bell.
Atterbury's housekeeper answered the door a
minute later, and she let me in, although she
seemed somewhat surprised to see me.
"Is Mr. Atterbury here?" I asked.
"No, sir," the woman said. "He telephoned last
night to say that he would be staying in town for
the rest of the week."
That was odd, I thought. He had promised me
that he would keep an eye on Pat.
"May I tell Mr. Atterbury that you stopped by
to see him, sir?" the woman asked.
"No, that's all right. 1911 give him a call when I
get back to the city. I just came out to pick up Miss
Staley."
"You just missed her," the housekeeper said.
I snapped, grabbing the startled
woman.
She hiccoughed. "Patricia left here about eleven-
thirty with the two fellows that Mr. Atterbury sent
out for her."
"Who were they?"
"l don't know," the frightened woman sput-
tered. "They were from the Foundation, I think."
"Did Mr. Atterbury tell you he was sending
someone for Pat?"
"No, he didn't. But that nice Mr. Barnes tele-
phoned the Foundation and let me speak with one



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