Sicilian Slaughter by Don Pendleton, Jim Peterson

hovel, kicking it in, gun in hand.
    Fretta made no pretense whatever of resisting. He knew who these men were, and when they asked, he told them exactly what they wanted to know: the old truck was a faded blue, it had a crumpled right-front fender, there were noticeable rust spots on the hood. The man? The man was big, over six feet tall, weighing at least 95 kilos, perhaps a hundred. And, yes, my masters, he did indeed have eyes like blue-stained ice. Go? I only know he sent me to buy native clothing for him, a few extra cans of gasoline and a crate of oil. The engine on that old truck needed a complete overhaul, valves and rings most, pumped oil like a furnace, looked like an old-time locomotive coming, gushing blue smoke. I saw no arms, only a large crate of wood which the big man lashed down on the bed of the truck. Yes, he spoke some Italian, not such fine grammar, Sicilian dialect, looked
Siciliano,
to me. Of course, at your orders, always.
    That they let him keep the new truck and did not damage it sent Fretta into such a fit of astonishment he decided to see a priest first thing tomorrow and legalize his marriage to the woman he'd lived with for nineteen years and who had borne all his eleven children.
    When the old truck quit on him, finally expiring by suiciding itself when it threw a rod through the block within sight of Reggio, Mack Bolan had no idea how lucky that seemingly disastrous incident was.
    Because during the last hours of darkness, Traditore, Frog, and four soldiers had chartered a plane and flown to Reggio. Traditore knew he should have been in Naples consolidating his new position, but at the same time he knew there would be no position, and he would be too dead to fill it, unless he got Mack Bolan, The Executioner, and took him down forever.
    Afraid to notify the Reggio don and recruit gunmen because that might expose his cannibalistic testimony which liquidated Don Tronfio, Astio had no choice other than recruiting and arming low-grade freelance local help, some of whom Frog had to show how to load their weapons.
    Then Astio spread dollars around, merchants, street hawkers, taxi drivers, shoeshine boys, everyone he could think of who might by remotest possibility spot Bolan coming into town, or see him if he was already in Reggio. Then Astio could only sit back and wait for Bolan to come into the trap, and Bolan did.

11
Reggio Ragazza
    Alma Bellezza had finished her morning milking, turned the cattle out, strained the milk through clean white sacking into pails, loaded the pails with sealed lids on the cart, and had the team hitched, when she heard the truck coming.
    She looked up as the old blue junker went past, moving hardly as fast as she could walk, rattling, and from its guts coming a fearful clatter. Stinking blue smoke fogged from the exhaust pipe.
    Then she noticed the driver. Her loins trembled and her breath caught, and she felt the nipples of her bosoms stiffen. Even as he sat in the cab of the truck, he looked immense; and she quivered under the fleeting gaze and white smile he gave her as he nursed the truck along the poor road toward the city. If she hurried, she could overtake him, perhaps. She started to climb up on the wagon, then changed her mind and ran back into the house. She emerged a few moments later in a fresh dress, her hands and arms and ankles freshly washed, and wearing her best bonnet. She checked the milk cans again, then climbed upon the seat and urged the astonished horses into a brisk trot. Ten minutes later, her heart seemed to come up into her mouth as she topped a rise and saw at the bottom of the hill that the truck had pulled off to one side, and the man was out with his head stuck down inside the engine box.
    She slowed the horses.
    Bolan had caught the movement on the road at the top of the hill when the team came into sight. He did not turn his head but a fraction of an inch, so he could see from the side of his eye, and recognized the milkmaid from the