COQL or deluge API, how to get the total count that match criteria?

This is a simple count, but given the 200 record limit, and the fact that I don't need any of the results, just the count, why do I have to page through and perform such an expensive operation. The following shows how I successfully used deluge and COQL to aggregate a count, but again, there must be an easier way that is less expensive. The following I use to count Contacts, and it iterates 32 times, that's 32 queries, just to get a single number: row count.

selectQuery = "select id from Contacts WHERE id is not null";
/**
* @param {String} selectQuery - The select query to be executed
* e.g. select id from module where id is not null
* NOTE: the select query will have limit appended to it. You must select the id.
*/
queryMap = Map();
attempt = " ";
retryLoop = attempt.leftPad(99).replaceAll(" ",","); // Creates 100 loops
iteration = 0;
aggregateIds = List();
for each retry in retryLoop
{
info "iteration: " + iteration;
queryMap.put("select_query", selectQuery + " limit " + iteration*200 + ", 200");
response = invokeurl
[
    url :"https://www.zohoapis.com/crm/v3/coql"
    type :POST
    parameters:queryMap.toString()
    connection: "coql"
];
// Create a combined List
for each pointer in response.get("data")
{
      aggregateIds.add(pointer.get("id"));
}
if(response.get("info").get("more_records") == false)
{
    break;
}
iteration = iteration + 1;
}

aggregateIdsSize = aggregateIds.size();
info "aggregateIds: " + aggregateIdsSize + " for " + selectQuery;
return aggregateIdsSize;

How can this be done more simply, with less computation and complication?

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