"Poe? You outta you mind? Thatsa name of a river——or a raven. I'm a forgetta which. My namesa Manelli!"
"Scusi, signore," the big man said with exaggerated politeness, "ma se lei è veramente italiano, non' è l'uomo che cerchiamo."
Lenny's Italian was limited to a handful of words. He know he was trapped, but he faced the situation with aplomb. "Thatsa lie! I was inna Chicago that night!"
"Ah! Cosè credero. Avanti, saccentone." He jerked his thumb toward the gate. "Let's go."
Lenny muttered something that the big man didn't quite catch.
"What'd you say?"
"Upper United States—the northern United States," Lenny said calmly shoving his four hundred fifty dollars into his pocket. "That's where Chicago is. Never mind. Come in, boys; back to the drawing board."
The two men escorted Lenny to a big, powerful Lincoln; he climbed into the back seat with the big one while the other one got behind the wheel.
As soon as they had left the racetrack and were well out on the highway, the driver said: "You want to call in, Mario? This traffic is pretty heavy."
The big man beside Lenny leaned forward, over the back of the front seat, unhooked the receiver of the scrambler-equipped radiophone, and sat back down. He thumbed a button on the side of the handset and said: "This is Seven Oh Two." After a short silence, he said: "You can call off the net. You want him brought in?" He listened for a moment. "O.K. Are we cleared through the main gate? O.K. Off."