Blood dribbled from his lips.
“I tried to tell you, old-timer,” Bolan said gently.
“Oh,” the farmer said. “Well, it’s too late now.” His head turned slowly to one side as his lifeless hand slid to the straw-covered floor.
The Executioner ran to the door. Carboni had killed again, and he was out there somewhere. This was one score the Executioner had to settle now!
13
The Executioner jammed a new magazine in the Uzi and ran to the barn’s front door. Outside in the bright afternoon sunshine he saw no movement. The side screen door to the house stood open. He remembered the old man saying “we.” Was there a woman in the house?
Then he thought of something more deadly. The farmer had a shotgun; it was likely he also had a rifle. Bolan backed away from the door, realizing that Carboni might already have a rifle from the kitchen or from over the mantel. Found it and be loaded and waiting for Bolan to step out the door.
The Executioner went out the back door and moved around to the side. He could see everything in the yard — the barn, a machine shed, a small granary, a chicken coop, the well house, the house, a garage. Parked in the garage was a Ford Edsel with its unique grill and front end outward. This was one farm that was not entirely up- to-date.
Bolan lay beside the barn, shielded from the house by the foundation. Carboni was not running now. The Executioner could sense the man’s hatred, his eagerness to use his long gun.
This would be a battle of willpower and nerves, Bolan decided. He glanced at his watch. Four-thirty. Another three hours until dark. Bolan shifted. He could lie there without moving until dark if he had to, but he knew that Carboni would be active long before that.
Ten minutes later a roar came from an upstairs window. Now a rifle barked six times, as the weapon — a single shot bolt action, Bolan guessed — pounded rounds into each of the buildings the gunner could see from his high ground.
“You son of a bitch! Come out and fight!” Carboni yelled.
Bolan sent five rounds from the Uzi into the open window, then slid back out of sight of the target and waited. After a few moments he moved up quickly, looked at the house, then jerked back as Carboni put a rifle slug into the foundation beside Bolan.
It was a stalemate. Bolan had to turn it around. If he could get close enough he could pitch a fragger in the upstairs window. But by then Carboni might have moved.
He had to lure Carboni out of his shelter and not get himself killed doing it. The Edsel kept creeping into his mind. He ran behind the barn, into the cornfield and over to the rear of the garage. It had a back door. He slipped inside and checked the Edsel. It was out of gas and had one low tire in front.
The machine had not been used for some time.
But Carboni didn’t know that. The window where the Mafia hoodlum lay was almost out of sight. Carboni would have to lean out to see the garage. Bolan eased the hand brake off the car, pushed the shift lever to neutral and went to the back of the rig.
The farmyard had a slight slope. Bolan pushed the car to the end of the garage, then jumped back and stayed inside the cover as the Edsel rolled fifty feet forward and stopped. He threw a rock at the Edsel, banging it off the front fender.
Through a crack in one of the boards in the garage Bolan could see the second-floor window. Carboni’s head popped out for a second. He looked at the old car and swore.
The Executioner gave the killer enough time to get down the steps and check out the Edsel from a side window in the house. Vince would kill the car or try to get it for his own use.
A minute later the side door jolted open and Carboni ran through it. In each hand he carried a jar with a flaming rag on top of it. A deer rifle was slung over his shoulder. He ran halfway to the car and threw one of the jars. It flew over the Edsel and splattered burning gasoline toward Bolan.
The Executioner blasted four rounds from the Uzi through the smoke. Then he saw the other firebomb sailing through the air and ran to the side. The bomb hit and broke, gushing burning gasoline inside the garage. The Executioner dashed away from the smoke and fire and saw Carboni trying to start the Edsel. The battery ground the starter three times, then the solenoid only clicked as the battery went dead.
Before Bolan could fire, Carboni left the car and ran behind the gasoline smoke screen back into the house.
Slowly the fire ate up the gasoline in the yard. The garage blazed up into a real fire. The Executioner ran to the barn for cover. He waited there for a few moments, then sprinted to the machine shed.
Because Carboni didn’t fire again, Bolan figured he must be running short on ammunition for the heavy pistol.
The Executioner looked around. The shed contained a variety of farm implements. Right in front sat a midsize crawler tractor with a bulldozer blade on it. Bolan knew how to operate the machine. He checked the tank; it was half full of diesel fuel. The engine kicked over on the third try, and he lifted the blade until it blocked his view and shielded him from any rifle rounds from Carboni, then nudged the big doors open with the blade.
He hit the throttle and moved straight for the farmhouse’s back door. A shot barked from the house, hit the steel dozer blade in front and ricocheted. It sounded like the deer rifle, maybe a 30.06.
The crawler responded well to his touch on the brakes, holding one tread and turning as the other tread kept moving. He adjusted his route once more and clanked, rattled and squeaked straight at the house.
Two more shots came and then silence. Glass broke in an upstairs window. Bolan looked up and realized Carboni could look down past the blade directly at him. He bailed out and ran into the house as a rifle slug from the second floor plowed into the ground where Bolan had been a moment before.
Bolan ran through the kitchen, hunting the stairs. This was house-to-house fighting, something he knew a lot about. He pulled one of the fragger grenades off his combat webbing and held it in his left hand.
The old wooden house creaked as the man upstairs moved around.
The hit man had worked himself into a corner. There was no way he could go except down. Bolan eased halfway up the open stairs and threw the grenade into the room where he figured Carboni was hiding. The bomb went off with a roar.
When the sound echoed across the fields, Bolan listened for human sounds. There were none. He charged up the steps, the Uzi ready with the last rounds in the magazine.
But Carboni was not in the room. Bolan edged around the hall to the second big room, but found it empty, too. The window was open and Bolan watched as Carboni limped across the roof, then ducked and jumped from the low front porch to the ground and out of sight.
Bolan heard a cry of pain as the guy landed on his wounded leg.
For a minute nothing moved. The yard was quiet. Bolan remembered that the hit man did not have the rifle with him when he ran across the roof. He could have dropped it over the side first. Either way the enemy was getting low on ammunition.
Bolan scowled — so was he. There were only five or six rounds in the Uzi, about ten shots left for the big .44 AutoMag, and the Beretta was on its last magazine.
He ran to the other room and looked out at the yard. There was no evidence that Carboni had gone to the barn or any of the sheds. He must still be hugging the first floor of the house. But inside or out?
The garage burned fiercely, sending a trail of black smoke into the sky. Somebody would report it soon by telephone, and a rural fire department would wheel in.
As if responding to his thoughts, a siren wailed in the distance. Bolan snapped a shot from the Beretta into some shadows near the front porch, then pulled back from the window. There was no answering fire.
The siren came closer. Bolan checked both windows again. No Carboni. Where had he gone?
The vehicle with the siren raced down the long farm driveway. That was when Bolan saw that it was a police car or a sheriff’s rig. The officer was driving directly into eternity. Carboni would waste him the second he
