an animal, even of a louse like Harris-Aidn't fit Bollinger's image of a
superman. He liked to meet his prey head-on, to get close, so that
there was at least a hint of danger.
The trick was to force them out of the shaft without killing them; to
herd them to other ground where the plan could be carried out. He
pointed the pistol down, aimed wide of the woman's head and squeezed the
trigger.
The shot exploded; ear-splitting noise assaulted Connie from every side.
Over the diminishing echoes, she could hear the bullet ricocheting from
one wall to the other, farther down the shaft.
The situation was so unreal that she had to wonder if it was transpiring
in her mind. She supposed it was possible that she was in a hospital
and that all of this was the product of a fevered imagination, the
delusions of madness.
Descending the ladder, she repeatedly caught herself murmuring softly:
sometimes it was jumbled phrases that made little sense, sometimes
strings of utterly meaningless sounds. Her stomach rolled over like a
fish on a wet boat dock. Her bowels quivered. She felt as if a bullet
had already ripped into her, already had torn apart her vital organs.
Bollinger fired again.
The shot seemed less sharp than the one before it. Her ears were
desensitized, still ringing from the first explosion.
For a woman who had experienced little emotionaland no physical-terror
in her life, she was handling herself surprisingly well.
When she looked down, she saw Graham let go of, the ladder with one
hand. He grabbed the railing that ringed the platform. He took one
foot off the ladder; hesitated, leaning at a precarious angle; started
to bring his foot back; suddenly found the courage to put it on the edge
of the platform. For a moment, fighting his own terror, he stayed that
way, crucified between the two points of safety. She was about to call
to him, urge him on, when he finally freed himself of the ladder
altogether, wobbled on the brink of the platform as if he would fall,
then got his balance and climbed over the railing.
She descended the last dozen rungs much too fast and reached the
platform as Bollinger fired a third shot. She hurried through the red
door that Graham held open for her, into the maintenance supply room on
the twenty-seventh level.
The first thing she saw was the blood on his trousers. A bright spot of
it. As big as a silver dollar. Glistening on the gray fabric.
'What happened?'
'Had these in my pocket,' he said, holding up the scissors. 'A couple
of floors back, when I almost fell, the blades tore through the lining
and gouged my thigh.
'Is it bad?'
'No.'
urt?
'Not much.'
'Better get rid of them.'
'Not just yet.'
