slooooooooooowwwwwwwwwllllllllyyyyyyyyy move
forward again
oh no no NOOOOOOO
don't start moving yet
TICK TICKTICKTICK moving now and she is running like hell for the car knowing deep inside that for days she has made love to a man who is who is oh oh oh oh ooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhGodnoohno no no no inside her secret heart she knows that she is running from DEATH! Running behind her now she can hear the footfalls thudding behind her and mindless of the pain she runs barefooted across the drive and oh jeez the keys are inside in my purse she thinks and then no she remembers the emergency key in the small metal thing under the bumper and she snatches at the magnetic box and it won't come loose and she feverishly rips it off, ripping her long blood-red nails in the process, and fumbles with the key, lurching in behind the wheel and smashing the door locks down as she grinds the ignition on, his hand grabbing the door just as she locks it, his arm back in a killing mode as she guns the motor, smashing out with a deadly elbow as she tromps the accelerator peeling out in a scrrrrreeeeeeee of smoking tires as, the window beside her spider tracks in a heart-attacking explosion from the thrown elbow strike and he leaps into his own vehicle and grabs the key off the visor but behind the wheel of a car Noel Collier is his equal and the Rolls roars away through the night, the killer close in pursuit.
She will drive to the police station. He won't dare follow her there but she remembers who this man is and he is already closing on her fast. She heads for her own house nearby, operating by reflex now, squealing into the drive with her hand on the automatic door opening a block away and she is running inside and oh my Christ he is in there waiting for her in the darkness and she feels his strong grip knock the automatic from her hand and her heart almost leaps out of her beautiful chest as the voice of the cop Jack Eichord whispers in her ear, “Get down in the spa room.'
And she is almost in shock and starts to ask, “What...” the first word only a quarter second from her mouth. “What?
All of Eichord's concentration now is shifted from a defensive posture to an attack mode. And the thoughts you think at a time like this come in a lightning blur, intensified by the survival instincts and triggered by the clutching talons of danger, Eichord watching both the image recognition pattern of the DEtection MONitor and the doorway to his right knowing the killer is coming and then seeing the conflict and wondering who or what but no time now and in the midst of all this a ridiculous thought.
He thinks, If this was a movie the music would be playing a woodpecker electro-motif. The Wizard of Oz ad told him about it the other day. Something the Soviets had once used on areas of the recalcitrant populace they wanted to punish. Ozzie Barnes had played a few seconds of it over the phone. It was an incessant variant of the Chinese water torture, a note repeated staccato endlessly, the sort of thing that was punishing enough just to hear via a taped shortwave monitor, and it would have made a nice background score for that second in time. That was the absurd thought his mental defense mechanisms evoked as he thumbed back the hammer on the Smith and when the dark form crashed through the door he squeezed one off just a hair below the eye slits. No “Freeze! Police!” Just forearms resting on a chair back, trying not to make any mistakes, no freeze—just a squeeze, and the maggie loud in the house, pyrotechnics momentarily blinding as his bullet smashed out drilling the intruder smack dab between the running lights.
It was never over until you made sure. Making sure was the hardest part, but it was the next step and he slapped the wall a couple of times with his left hand, right hand still in the weapon-up position, not hearing the screams of the terror-stricken woman down in the stone room, hammer thumbed back again, smoking muzzle pointing at the prone man's head, and he stepped over on the muscular wrist as a precaution and reached over to touch the head, instantly realizing it had been a mistake.
Joseph Hackabee a/k/a Joseph Houtcheson was about half empty of gray matter. Eichord's single shot had covered Noel Collier's nice white wall in red, dripping mist and assorted nasties and brain-burger bits, and some of it was on his hand. He fought bile back and wiped it off. Joe had a fourteen-inch Randall-type fighting knife which Eichord picked up and walked out of the open door and into a crowd of police.
“(something).” Michaels was patting him on the back and he caught “IAD” and “shooting team” and he popped his neck and it cracked, and he swallowed, and he could hear a little now, still half-deafened by the gun report after all the silence.
Noel Collier ran up to them and tried to say something to him but he was already moving, and he acted like he hadn't heard her and just kept going.
There were guys everywhere. Three or four cars had their bubble-gum machines on and the light bars were throwing eerie shadows everywhere. A medical dude said his name and he turned and the guy said, “You all right?'
And Eichord said, “Are the Kennedys gun-shy?” And he kept walking in the direction of his unmarked car.
Yeah. Shit. I'm great. Never better. I'm in Dallas fucking Texas and I just shot a man to death. I'm fine. Wonder how late it is anyway? Gotta call a lady about a dog. See if she takes in strays.
Postmortem
Dear Mr. Eichord:
Subsequent to my contacting Chief Mulcahey with respect to my concerns in light of the notoriety following the fatal shooting of Mr. Joseph Hackabee in Dallas, Texas, please find enclosed deposition(s), copies of the Houtcheson X rays, and other related material of possible interest.
After seeing a photograph of the deceased, and taped interviews with Mr. William Hackabee, I contacted Chief Mulcahey. Upon receipt of my original deposition I was asked to forward this material along to you, and as per our initial conversation of 26 February, I am also sending you this summary and overview of my report to the Major Crimes Task Force, which is written pursuant to your request “in simple English.”
On or about the evening of 8 February, I was watching the evening news broadcast on Channel 5 When a story ran showing a photograph of the twin of Mr. William “Ukie” Hackabee, who had been the self-confessed murder suspect in the Dallas Grave-digger investigation, which ran during a story that included an interview with the deceased man's brother. I remembered treating this individual here in Bellaire this past fall (September 9, 16, 21, SEE ENC.) and was able to produce our records of said treatment in this office.
The individual whom we treated used the pseudonym “Joseph Houtcheson” (SEE ENC.). He listed no family doctor, which was attributed to a transient life-style, and childhood medical records had been lost. Subsequent to tests and X rays made of Mr. Houtcheson, who had a history of severe headache pain, the first of several skull X rays revealing a possible pinealoma, which is a type of brain tumor, was shown to the patient. He became agitated and abusive, and abruptly left these premises in a state of extreme anger.
In several attempts made by our office we were never successful in locating Mr. Houtcheson again, either by telephone or via the mail, for the purposes of arranging treatment with either our clinic or some other suitable
