The blare of loud Neo Punk Rock blasted out as she opened the door upon the crowd.
I got on the phone. Ambo answered.
“Your quarry has just gone in the disco, Harlot Haven,” I shouted.
“I thought she was going to the girls’ apartment.”
“Yes, of course, she is. But she has stopped off in a disco. Get your process server over there fast! And keep the apartment covered!”
“At once!” said Ambo.
I rang off.
The Countess Krak was being steered through the madly whirling crowd to a table by a waiter who was putting a bill in his pocket. The table was a bit above the dancers and over to the side. A good place to trap a person in.
She sat down. Her eye went straight across the room. The three girls were sitting there! They had not gone home! The Countess had trailed them to a disco!
The poor innocent things were slugging back tall drinks and laughing. Toots Switch gave Maizie another punch in her swollen abdomen and Dolores went into shrieks of laughter.
The dancers were gyrating around. Colored lights were flashing over them. A Neo Punk Rock group, huge feather plumes sticking out of their shaven heads, were leaping about with their instruments, making a deafening din.
Three young men came over to the table of the girls. Apparently they did not know the girls, for there was an immediate round of introductions. One of the young men was white, the second was Hispanic, the third was black. They were dressed Neo Punk Rock—in feathers and breechclouts over cloth with spangles. Whatever they were saying was lost in the din. The girls got them to sit down and started pouring liquor into them from their own glasses. The white one was pulling up Dolores’ skirt and putting his hand under it. Dolores was screaming with laughter.
“Hussies,” muttered the Countess Krak, and took a contemptuous sip of the Seven Up she’d been served.
Two young men suddenly appeared in front of her table. “Wanta dance?” said one, lifting his Neo Punk Rock breechclout.
The two young men suddenly let out screams simultaneously. They fled. I couldn’t understand it. The Countess had not even paused in raising the Seven Up to her lips. She had not even made a sudden motion. But she must have kicked both their shins underneath the table.
The three on the other side of the room had gotten up to dance. A new piece was starting with savage, sexual drumbeats, and a spin of colored lights pulsed in rhythm to it. The three, including Maizie with her enormous belly, jostled into the dancers and began to grind and crush against their partners. The chorale came on:
Shiver, shiver, shimmy!
And rub, rub, rub!
If you aren’t coming,
Put it in the tub!
Four and twenty harlots
Leaped about with glee.
If you can’t whip her,
Put her on your knee!
If you can’t (bleep) her,
Get her to go down!
Can’t have little babies
Running ’round the town!
So shiver, shiver, shimmy!
And come, come, come!
WHEEEOOOOOO!
“Disgusting,” muttered the Countess Krak. But it was apparently a comment directed toward two Neo Punk Rock men who had joined the partner of Toots Switch and were lifting their breech clouts at her while she screamed with delight.
The Countess Krak’s eye lighted on a commotion at the door. The shabby man in the shabby coat was thrusting his head with its shabby hat into the faces of people near the door. He rushed further into the room. He took advantage of the lull between numbers to tear about looking at everyone.
The Countess Krak’s eye shifted. Inspector Grafferty was at the door, two policemen with him, backup for the process server. Aha! I was getting action! Dingaling, Chase and Ambo had pull!
The crowd saw the cops and became uneasy.
The process server was tearing all over the place. He was looking at everyone. A new piece had started up and he was jostled.
He pushed up to the raised platform.
He peered into the face of the Countess Krak.
Then he RUSHED ON AND PEERED AT ANOTHER FACE!
I blinked.
How had he missed? Ah, he hadn’t missed. He had come back and was looking at the Countess Krak, as I could see in her peripheral vision.
The Countess Krak raised her palm to her lips. What was she holding? She was looking straight toward Grafferty over by the door. Then she glanced at her palm. A little tube. She pressed a tiny switch on it. Then she put the end of the tube in her mouth, aimed at Grafferty and blew!
An astonished look came over Grafferty’s face. He suddenly roared out above the music, “POLAR BEARS! MEN! ARREST THESE POLAR BEARS!”
His men rushed into the place, nightsticks flying, clouting everyone, screaming, “You’re under arrest!”
Grafferty kept screaming, “POLAR BEARS!”
People were rushing for exits.
The band deserted en masse, diving behind the stage in a clatter of falling instruments.
Others on the raised platform rushed about. The shabby man went down under the press of bodies.
The Countess Krak stood up, finished her Seven Up, picked up her purse. Suddenly I saw by her arm that she was very dark tan! She was made up as a high-yellow in an evening gown!
She was walking carefully. The shabby man was on the floor.
I knew she would do it!
Very precisely and exactly, she stepped squarely on the middle of his face!
And gave her foot a neat twist!
The turmoil was dying down.
A cop shouted, “We can’t find any polar bears, Inspector!”
“POLAR BEARS!” screamed Grafferty. “Arrest them anyway!”
A cop was beside the Countess Krak. Almost all the other patrons were gone. “Come with me!” the cop said, brandishing his nightstick.
“Ah’m not a polah beah,” said the Countess Krak.
“Yeah, excuse me,” said the flustered cop.
She walked past Grafferty, who was still screaming at the door. She reached out and plucked something from his neck, a movement so swift it was just a blur on the screen.
Suddenly I knew what she had done, (bleep) her. It was an Eyes and Ears of Voltar dart that, when put into a person, gave him sound and image that would make him think he had gone crazy. But Grafferty had been incapable of that and had added his own interpretation to his vision.
Suddenly the Countess’ viewer was black. I could not account for it at all.
A voice—Bang-Bang’s! Muffled as though through a partition. “Jesus, Miss Joy, I think somebody must have set us up. Did you get the pictures?”
“I think we’ll get much better ones,” said the Countess Krak. “They left with five young men. Drive to the apartment now. Take your time.”
A motor started up. Aha, she was in some kind of a vehicle!
“Bang-Bang,” she said, “I’m puzzled. What’s the primitives’ name of that activity?”
“Neo Punk Rock,” said Bang-Bang. “It’s all the rage now.”
“Hmm,” the Countess Krak muttered to herself. “But why do they do it standing up?”
I sat back. I didn’t have to do another thing. She was heading right into a steel-jawed trap of shoot-on-sight!
PART FIFTY-TWO
Chapter 3
Krak’s viewer was very dark for a long time. Only the sound of traffic and the hum of the motor of their own car. I wished I knew what sort of a machine it was: Seemed very strange to have no windows in it. Well, I would keep alert. Sooner or later she would look at it in a lighted area and maybe even at its license plates. Those license plate numbers were a vital factor in any police activity, so much so that you couldn’t really harass citizens at all unless all vehicles were numbered. But these considerations were just to occupy the time. Good Gods, the Bronx was a long way by car from Manhattan.
Then the vehicle slowed. It went for a little distance a
nd then speeded up again. Bang-Bang’s voice: “Miss Joy. I think somebody set us up again. I counted four security men as we went by that apartment house. All armed with riot guns. We was expected. I think I better take you back to the hotel.”
Silence. Then, “Bang-Bang, is there a police station near here?”
“I’ll look. But Jesus Christ, ma’am—beggin’ your pardon—you bring cops in and they’ll nab us sure. They won’t never go up against security police like those. They looked TOUGH!”
“Go to the police station.”
“I don’t like this, Miss Joy. And I don’t know where one is. Usually a proud type like me doesn’t descend to hobnobbing with low-life cops.”
A light came on. She was sitting in a little compartment. It had a narrow bunk and a pile of clothes and a small door that went to what was probably the driver’s chair. What was this thing? She was looking in a directory open to the section, “Police.”
“Four thirty-five Grassy Meadows Lane,” she said. “Go there.”
“What is it?”
“Metropolitan Police Vice Squad, Bronx Division.”
“Vice?” said Bang-Bang.
“That’s what we’re dealing with,” said the Countess. “Drive!”
A muttering Bang-Bang drove them many blocks and then stopped again. “All right, Miss Joy. But mark my words, rubbing elbows with police is just one step lower than mucking with the Army.”
“Come back here.”
The door opened and the diminutive Bang-Bang crawled back from the wheel. He hunkered down, watching her.
The Countess Krak had a small package in her hand. It said:
Eyes and Ears of Voltar
Follow Compeller: When Unit A is worn by the operative and Unit B has been placed on or into the subject, Unit B will compel the subject to follow the operative by inducing a wrong feeling when he does not. For use in causing subjects to walk into embarrassing situations where divorce evidence can be obtained and subject executed.
The Countess activated Unit A and pinned it on Bang-Bang. It looked like a lapel button—membership in some club? She handed him Unit B.
Bang-Bang looked at it. It appeared to be a tiny piece of dark adhesive.
“Now, Bang-Bang,” said the Countess Krak. “You walk in there and look around and find a policewoman, put that patch on her and come back here. She’ll chase you.”
“Hey, no,” said Bang-Bang. “We used to do this when we were kids and we always got caught. I ain’t throwing no rocks at any cop just to get chased!”
Patiently, the Countess Krak started to explain it to him in more detail.
I did not wait. Here was a new opportunity!
I snatched at the phone. I scrambled through the directory. I dialed the Bronx division of the vice squad.
The watch sergeant answered.
Urgently, I said, “There’s an extraterrestrial fiend right outside your station! She is sending a demon in to grab and rape one of your policewomen!”
“Well, more power to her,” said the watch sergeant. “Why don’t you cranks stay off this line!” He hung up. It was no use. I had to sit there helplessly. But never mind, those security men at the apartment were on the job.
Bang-Bang slid open a large side door. The police station across the street came into view. He stepped out and somewhat nervously crossed the street, went up the steps and in.
He was gone for quite a little while. The Countess watched.
Oh, it was very plain what the Countess meant to do. Bigamy, adultery and other crimes in the Confederation are punishable by death. And the only way you can get a divorce as such is to involve the marital partner in one of these and get him or her terminated by the State. She was going to kidnap a member of the vice squad, get Bang-Bang to rape her, take photographs and use these to blackmail the female officer into arresting the poor, innocent girls! That is what we would do in the Apparatus. And the Countess knew how the Apparatus operated: she’d been a victim of it herself.
Here came Bang-Bang. He sauntered elaborately down the steps of the Vice Squad building. Behind him the door sprang open. A tall policewoman was getting into a dark blue uniform coat.
Bang-Bang strolled across the street toward the vehicle.
The tall policewoman gave her cap a tug and followed.
Bang-Bang paused beside the open door, inspecting his fingernails.
The policewoman crossed the street toward him. She was an athletic brunette, rather handsome-featured in a hard-bitten sort of way.
Bang-Bang sprang into the door and got behind Krak.
The Countess lurked in the dark.
I wanted to scream to the policewoman, “No, no! Don’t enter that vehicle. Dishonor or death await you there!” But I was miles away and had to watch the awful tragedy unfold.
The woman stepped in through the wide side door.
There was a hiss.
Gas! The Countess had used a gas capsule! Oh, this was Apparatus work indeed! (Bleep) her, why hadn’t I prevented her from stealing that Zanco kit!
The vehicle door slid shut.
There was movement in the dark interior. Bang-Bang was going back into the driver’s compartment. A flash of light as he opened and closed that door to go through it.
The vehicle started up.
Click, and the overhead light was turned on by Krak. There lay the policewoman, out cold.
Swiftly, the Countess stripped off the victim’s uniform. She laid the woman out on the couch. She tied her hands and feet with cord.
I waited for the expected halt of the vehicle and rape.
The Countess was taking off her own clothing.
What horror was I about to witness? What perversion? Was the Countess a lesbian? I had never suspected that. There were no lesbians in the Confederation. If anything like that were detected, those involved would have been executed. There lay the policewoman, naked now. Maybe I could get the Countess for this crime under Voltar law. Or Earth law, for that woman was a member of the New York Vice Squad and would not be slow to strike back when she became aware she had been violated.
Something was wrong.
The Countess was not touching the woman!
Krak was simply putting on the woman’s clothing!
She even threw a blanket over the female police officer.
I thought, what a waste. If that had been I, I would have raped the victim just to go by the textbook. Was it possible that I did not quite understand the motives and standards of the Countess Krak? (Bleep) her, I couldn’t figure her out.
She was doing something to her own face. She turned off the light.
The vehicle stopped.
“We’re here,” said Bang-Bang.
What in the name of the Gods was the Countess Krak up to? That policewoman would only be unconscious five or ten minutes. Time to rape her and take photos was nearly gone.
Yet the Countess Krak was simply opening the door!
Oh, this Manco fiend was quite beyond me!
PART FIFTY-TWO
Chapter 4
When the Countess Krak left the vehicle she did me the disservice of not looking back.
She walked along a broken sidewalk under broken trees, poorly lit by broken lights. She was carrying a case.
She went a block.
The apartment house!
Two security guards in gray before the door. They were holding rifles or riot guns. They were very alert.
The Countess Krak walked straight up to them. They eyed her suspiciously.
She flashed an ID folder in their faces. “Officer Maude Trick,” she said, in a voice quite unlike her own. “Metropolitan Vice Squad. Those three (bleepches) and their lover-boys get here yet?”
“Yeah,” said a tough security man.
“There was trouble at a disco. One left without paying for his pot. I got to interrogate.”
“Well, maybe so,” said the tough security man. “But I’ll have to check on you. This place is under threat and we got
orders to shoot to kill. Stand right there.”
He went inside.
Suddenly I got her plan! I grabbed the phone and dialed. It answered, “Dingaling, Chase and Ambo. If you want to sue somebody for slipping on their sidewalk or other vital actions, state details and your address when you hear the tone.”