The phone rang conveniently, sparing Batman the need to reply, giving him another few moments to organize his thoughts and lay the groundwork of a comprehensive plan. If these Bessarabians were real, and he had no reason to believe they weren’t, the combination of his computers and a little legwork would find them. He’d do that much for Gordon, and let the police force have the glory; he understood what Gordon said about morale. But the Bessarabians, as the buyers, were small potatoes on a larger plate.
He waited until Gordon hung up the phone and completed a notation in his daybook.
“Did your visitors drop any hints about the suppliers and sellers?”
Gordon closed the book slowly. Had he really thought he could invite his old friend here and not tell him the whole story?
“They mentioned a name: The Connection.”
Batman slouched back in the chair, steepling his fingers against the exposed portions of his face, rendering his expression completely unreadable. The Connection . . . that was a name that made, well—connections. He was the ultimate middleman—whenever a buyer needed a seller, or vice versa, the Connection could make the market. The operation started up after the war—the big one, WWII—and for decades intelligence considered it a “what” rather than a “who”: a loose association of wartime quartermasters, procurers, and scroungers doing what they did best.
There were files in the Batcave computer that continued to refer to the Connection as “it” or “they” in the stubborn belief that no man could move so much matérial. Those documents also supposed that if the Connection were a man, he’d have come forward by now to claim his honors. Easily ninety-five percent of his activities were legitimate; some were downright heroic. The world had cheered when three bulging freighters steamed into Ethiopia with enough grain to feed the country’s war-weary refugees for a month. The world, of course, had not known that buried deep in the wheat and corn was enough ammunition to feed the civil war for two years.
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