Now, in 1973, he occupied a modestly opulent office on Madison Avenue, where he did his modest best to pretend to the world at large that he was only a small cog--indeed, an almost invisible cog--in a large advertising machine. His best was, for all practical purposes, good enough.
Though it was common knowledge among the spoil-sport law enforcement officers who cared to look into the matter that Manelli was the real owner of the agency, there was no way to prove this. He didn't even have a phone under his own name. The only way to reach him was by going through his front man in the agency, a blank-faced, truculent Arab named Atif Abdullah Aoud.
According to the agent-in-charge of the New York office, Malone had his choice of two separate methods of getting to Manelli. One, more direct, was to walk in, announce that he was an agent of the FBI, and insist on seeing Manelli. If he had a search warrant, the A-in-C told him, he might even get in. But, even if he did, he would probably not get anything out of Manelli.
The second and more diplomatic way was to call up Atif Abdullah Aoud and arrange for an appointment.
Malone made his decision in a flash. He flipped on the phone and punched for a PLaza exchange.
The face that appeared on the screen was that of a fairly pretty, if somewhat vapid, brunette. "Rodger, Willcoe, O'Vurr and Aoud, good afternoon," she said.
Malone blinked.
"Who is calling, please?" the girl said. She snapped gum at the screen and Malone winced and drew away.
"This is Kenneth J. Malone," he said from what he considered a safe distance. "I want to talk to Mr. Aoud."
"Mr. Aoud?" she said in a high, unhelpful whine.
"That's right," Malone said patiently. "You can tell him that there may be some government business coming his way."
"Oh," she said. "But Mr. Aoud isn't in."
Mr. Aoud wasn't in. Mr. Aoud was out. Malone turned that over in his mind a few times, and decided to try and forget it just as quickly as possible. "Then," he said, "let me talk to one of the other partners."
"Partners?" the girl said. She popped her gum again. Malone moved back another inch.
"You know," he said. "The other people he works with. Rodger, or Willcoe, or O'Vurr."
"Oh," the girl said. "Them."
"That's right," Malone said patiently.
"How about Mr. Willcoe?" the girl said after a second of deep and earnest thought. "Would he do?"
"Why not let's try him and see?" Malone said.
"Okay," the girl said brightly. "Let's." She flashed Malone a dazzling smile, only slightly impeded by the gum, and flipped off. Malone stared at the blank screen for a few seconds, and then the girl's voice said, invisibly: "Mr. Willcoe will speak to you now, Mr. Melon. Thank you for waiting."
"I'm not--" Malone started to say, and then the face of Frederick Willcoe appeared on the screen.
Willcoe was a thin, wrinkle-faced man with very pale skin. He seemed to be in his sixties, and he looked as if he had just lost an all-night bout with Count Dracula. Malone looked interestedly for puncture marks, but failed to find any.
"Ah," Willcoe said, in a voice that sounded like crinkled paper. "Mr. Melon. Good afternoon."
"I'm not Mr. Melon," Malone said testily.
Willcoe looked gently surprised, like a man who has discovered that his evening sherry contains cholesterol. "Really?" he said. "Then I must be on the wrong line. I beg your pardon."
"You're not on the wrong line," Malone said. "I am Mr. Melon in a way." That didn't sound very clear when he got it out, so he added: "Your secretary got my name wrong. She thinks I'm Mr. Melon--Kenneth J. Melon."
"But you're not," Willcoe said.
Malone resisted an impulse to announce that he was really Lamont Cranston. "I'm Kenneth J. Malone," he said.
"Ah," Willcoe said. "Quite amusing. Imagine my mistaking you for a Mr. Melon, when you're really Mr. Malone." He paused, and his face got even more wrinkled. "But I don't know you under either name," he said. "What do you want?"
"I want to talk to Mr. Manelli," Malone said.
"But Mr. Aoud--"
"Mr. Aoud," Malone said, wondering if it sounded as silly to Willcoe as it did to him, "isn't in. So I thought you might be able to arrange an appointment for this afternoon."
Willcoe bit his lip. "Mr. Manelli isn't in just now," he said.
"Yes," Malone said. "I didn't think he would be. That's why I want to arrange an appointment for later, when he will be in."
"Does Mr. Manelli know you?" Willcoe said suspiciously, the wrinkles deepening again.
"He knows my boss," Malone said carefully. "You just tell him that this is something that ought to be worth time and money to him. His time, and his money."
"Hmm," Willcoe said. "I see. Would you wait a moment, Mr. Mel--Mr. Malone?"
The screen blanked out immediately. The wait this time was slightly longer.
And the next face that appeared on the screen was that of Cesare "Big Cheese" Antonio Manelli, the nearly invisible cog.
For a cog, the face was not a bad one. It was strong and well-muscled, and it had dark, wavy hair running along the top. At the sides of the face, the hair was greying slightly, and behind the grey two large ears stuck out. Manelli's nose was a long, faintly aquiline affair and his eyes were very pleasant and candid. They were light grey.
"Aha," Manelli said. "You are Mr. Malone, right?" His voice was guttural, but it was obvious that he was trying for control. "I regret announcing that I was out, Mr. Malone," he said. "But a man in my position--I like privacy, Mr. Malone, and I try to keep privacy for myself. Let me request you to answer a question, Mr. Malone: do I know you, Mr. Malone?"
"Not personally," Malone said. "I--"
"But I'm supposed to know your boss," Manelli said. "I don't know him, either, so far."
Malone shrugged. "I'm sure you do," he said, and dropped the name almost casually: "Andrew J. Burris."
Manelli raised his eyebrows. "So that's who you are," he said. "I ought to have known, Mr. Malone. And you want to talk to me a little bit, right?"
"That's right," Malone said.
"But this is no way to act, Mr. Malone," Manelli said reproachfully. "After all, we understand each other, you and me. What you should do, you should come in through channels, in the correct way, so everything it would be open and above the board."
"Through channels?" Malone said.
Manelli regarded him with a pitying glance. "You must be new on your job, Mr. Malone," he said. "Because there is an entire system built up, and you don't know about it. The way things work, we sit around and we don't see people. And then somebody comes and presents his credentials, you might say--search warrants, for instance, or subpoenas. And then we know where we are."
Malone shook his head. "This isn't that kind of call," he said. "It's more a friendly type of call."
"Mr. Malone," Manelli said. The reproach was stronger in his voice. "You must be very new at your job."
"Nevertheless," Malone said.
Manelli hesitated only a second. "Because I like you," he said, "and to teach you how things operate around here, I could do you a favor."
"Good," Malone said patiently.
"In an hour," Manelli said. "My place. Here."
The screen blanked out before Malone could even say goodbye.
Malone got up, went out to the corridor, and decided that, since he had time to kill, he might as well walk on down to Manelli's