blood. His body jackknifed and he fell forward on his face, like a man praying before Buddha.
As Hatcher rolled back into the bedroom he saw Lung vault the balcony. The mobster w-as silhouetted in the doorway, his face drenched with rain, his eyes glazed with hatred. An instant later he saw Hatcher but not before Hatcher fired a burst at him. Lung jumped to one side but a round clipped his ear, which vanished in a spray of blood and flesh. Hatcher leaped across the bed and dived through the doorway, swinging the Aug as he did.
He punched Lung across the jaw, shattering it, and knocked him back against the railing. But the Oriental was tougher than Hatcher thought. He lashed out with his knife and nicked Hatcher’s sleeve. Hatcher grabbed Lung’s wrist, shoved it up, twisting it away from him, and the knife dropped from his hands. Lung flipped backward he grabbed Hatcher, and they both landed on top of the railing. Hatcher hooked his elbow over the wooden crossbar and caught himself. He still had Lung by the wrist, but the falling gangster snapped loose and dropped, twisting as he fell, trying to get his feet under him. He landed sideways, the heavy fall slamming the air out of him and smashing two ribs, Lung bounced down the slope to the edge of the grass.
He rolled painfully over on his face, his broken ribs searing with pain, the side of his face ripped by Hatcher’s gunshots. He pulled his knees up under him and staggered in a crouch, down the hill toward darkness.
Behind him, Hatcher wrapped his legs around the post and slid to the ground. He snatched up Lung’s knife, which was lying in the mud, and charged down the slope.
Lung leaped into the tall grass, but his broken ribs were more painful than he could bear. He fell with a cry and began crawling the last few feet toward the dark. He was almost out of the spotlight’s arc when he felt Hatcher’s iron grasp on the back of his collar, felt himself hauled to his feet, heard Hatcher’s rasping voice in his ear, ‘You son of a bitch, Hatcher hissed, ‘you should have died a long time ago.’ He placed the point of Lung’s own stiletto against the back of the gangster’s neck, pressed on it hard enough to break the skin. ‘You’ve got some questions to answer,’ he rasped.
Lung, humiliated and defeated, got his legs under him and lunged upward, ramming the knife deep into his own throat. His cry was like an animal’s. Hatcher pulled his hand back, but the knife was buried so deep the soggy hilt slipped out of his hand. He heard Lung’s gargling scream, the unmistakable death rattle, felt him shudder and fall limp.
Hatcher stood over him, still grasping his collar. Lung’s head lolled forward. Hatcher dropped the killer face down in the mud. at his feet.
‘Welcome to hell,’ his shattered voice said as he stood over the dead killer’s body with rain pouring down his face.
HARD BALL
By daylight Cohen’s mansion had become a scene of frenzied activity. Six officers had finished photographing, interrogating and trying to piece together what had happened the night before. Photographers had taken pictures of bodies and cars and the remains of both had been hauled away. Now gardeners were at work repairing the damage in the front of the house.
An official car pulled in the driveway. Colonel Jeffrey Holloway got out and slowly turned on one heel, a 360- degree turn, surveying the battered grounds of Cohen’s home.
Holloway was not a pleasant person. The man who headed the Central District of the Hong Kong police was six feet tall, his white hair cropped almost Nazi-short, his face a thin, stern triangle dominated by almost blind-gray eyes. Even in the heat of the morning sun, his starched khaki uniform was unwrinkled.
He strode toward Cohen’s front door like a palace guard, so straight he almost leaned backward. He slapped one thigh with a riding crop, his symbol of rank.
Holloway sniffed about the house appraising the damage, then walked down to the open doorway to the guest room. Cohen, whose side had been nicked by a bullet, lay on the bed. Ping, the acupuncturist, leaned over him, placing needles here and there to kill the pain in the wounds, which a medical doctor had already repaired.
When Ping had finished his work, Holloway entered the bedroom. He ordered the man repairing the shattered wall mirrors to leave. Hatcher leaned against the wall and said nothing.
‘A gangland fight, two police officers dead, eight others dead. One hell of a mess, I’d say,’ he snorted.
‘You’re a little confused, aren’t you, Colonel?’ Cohen answered, still not looking at him. ‘My home was attacked by triad mobsters. How dare you come in here and imply that I instigated this mess.’
‘You’ve been asking for trouble for years,’ he snapped back.
Cohen lay quietly with the long needles protruding from his neck, stomach and knees. He lay there forming his strategy, deciding how best to handle the situation diplomatically, The old Tsu Fi had once advised Cohen, ‘Never force a man into a corner. He has no choice but to fight. Always leave a door open for him.’
Cohen sighed and folded his hands across his chest. ‘You’re walking a very thin wire’ he said to Holloway.
‘Is that a fact?’ the priggish officer said, raising his eyebrows..
‘Your man Varney was on the take,’ Cohen said flatly.
‘Ridiculous!’ Holloway snapped, his voice beginning to boil. ‘One of the finest officers on the squad.’
Cohen laughed at him. ‘First, ‘Varney tipped off Lung that Hatcher was in Hong Kong. Then he led the killers through my gates. And finally Lung’s own men killed him to shut him up.’
‘Absolute trash,’ the colonel bellowed.
‘Colonel, Varney visited Hatcher yesterday morning at the Peninsula. Within two hours, Lung broke into the room to kill Hatcher. He missed because Hatcher was out here. Then Varney called Hatcher here and told him the Triad Squad wanted to take him into protective custody. Are you aware of all that?’
Holloway silently glared at Cohen through narrowing eyes.
Cohen went on: ‘When he arrived at my gates he patched through a call to this number from his police car.
