could feel the gun there, hovering. I took deep breaths through my nose, filling my lungs with air, trying to will my body to relax, to calm. Pranayama. Start with the feet. Prepare yourself. Focus ki. If Gambino or Duran moved close enough, if I could move fast enough… If I couldn’t, it wouldn’t make much difference.
Rudy Gambino leveled the 9mm at me and said, “This kinda shit ain’t supposed to happen when I’m here, Dom.” When he said “Dom” there was a sharp pow out in the secretary’s office. A red spot grew low on Gambino’s abdomen. As he looked down at himself there was another pow , this one closer, in the doorway, and his right leg kicked back and he fell.
Ellen Lang stood in the doorway with my. 38, right arm out straight, left bent at the elbow and cupping the right, just the way Pike taught her. The lipstick didn’t look silly anymore. She was dark and alien and threatening, the way guys in the Nam who wore paint had looked. Duran saw the lipstick and smiled.
When the Eskimo’s gun moved I went into him, grabbing his gun hand with both of mine and forcing it in toward the elbow and away from his body. The gun kicked free and the Eskimo hit me on top of my right shoulder with an MX missile. My whole side went numb. I stayed inside, wrapping his hips and lifting and driving him away from the gun. His hands came down on my back, he pushed backward, and I let go. He landed on the floor sideways and went over on his hands and knees. I drove straight in with a power kick to the ribs and followed it with two punches, one to the same spot on the ribs, the other behind his left ear. The head punch broke one of my knuckles. Head punches will do that. I hit him a third time, this one beneath the ear where it was softer. The Eskimo grunted and heaved himself up. He didn’t look too much the worse for wear. You couldn’t say that about me.
Ellen was still in the door. Duran was on his feet now, saying something to her, but I couldn’t hear what. I said, “Only pussies kill seals and polar bears.”
The Eskimo smiled.
I threw an ashtray at him. It bounced off his arm.
He smiled some more.
I threw a Waterford lamp at him. He batted it aside.
There are any number of innovative ways to best an opponent. I simply had to think of one.
The Eskimo came for me. I faked to the outside, planted my left foot, and roundhouse kicked him in the face. His head snapped back and his nose burst into a red mist. He looked down at himself, then charged again. I dropped, spun, and kicked the outside of his knee. His leg buckled and he went down. I went in close, hitting his smashed nose with the heel of my hand and driving in behind it hard with my knees. His head rocked back and his eyes looked funny. I hit him with my left hand and lost a second knuckle. Bruce Lee could fight a thousand guys and not even split a fingernail. Karma. I saw Duran moving toward Ellen, walking across the room, the little sword in front of him.
“Ellen,” I said.
The Eskimo came up from underneath, locked his arms around my chest, and squeezed. It felt the way they describe a massive coronary: your lungs stop working, an elephant sits on your chest, and you know with absolute certainty that you are going to die.
Ellen stepped toward Duran and there was a loud BANG, louder than before because she was in the room now. Duran missed a step, then kept going, holding the sword straight out now and picking up speed.
I hammered down into the Eskimo’s face, hitting him on the top of the head and in the temples and in the eyes. He squeezed his eyes tight and hugged me closer. I felt something snap in my lower back. Short rib. What the hell, don’t need’m anyhow.
Ellen’s gun went off again. BANG.
I wanted to yell for her to get out of here, but knew if I gave up what breath I had I wouldn’t get any more. I stopped punching and tried to dig my thumbs into the Eskimo’s eyes, but he pressed his face into my chest. Everything in my peripheral vision began to grow fuzz. From out of another solar system I heard a gutty choonk- choonk-choonk, choonk-choonk. The HK. Pike. Not lucky for them, finding Pike. Ruin their whole day.
I reached above my head and brought my elbow down on the crown of the Eskimo’s head. A sharp pain lanced up my arm and another rib went, this one higher in my back.
Ellen’s gun sounded again BANG. Duran stopped and staggered sideways a step. Then he went on.
I brought my elbow down again, and this time the Eskimo sobbed. I did it again and his arms loosened. Whenever I hit him, something hot flashed in my elbow, letting me know the bone was broken. That didn’t seem to matter much. Not much mattered at all. Life’s priorities tend to shift when you’re in the process of dying.
I was seeing mostly gray shadows and squiggly bright things. I heard another BANG. That would be six. Ellen wouldn’t have any more. I hit the Eskimo again, and this time his arms released. I backed away, sucking air, each breath sending razors through my chest. The Eskimo tried to stand, pushing himself up onto one leg, then the other. He looked at me, swayed, and fell. Some tough sonofabitch.
Domingo Duran was on the floor at Ellen’s feet. She lowered the gun. Then she spit on him. She hadn’t moved, or flinched, or cowered. She hadn’t backed up.
I walked over to her, but it took a while. Not much was working right. I seemed to go sideways when I wanted to go straight, and I very badly wanted to throw up.
“Perry,” I said. “Perry.”
Then there was a lot of noise in the hall, and I dropped down to the rug, trying to find my pistol. I couldn’t and I started to cry. It had to be there somewhere. I had to find it because the game wasn’t over. It couldn’t be over until we had the boy, only the goons were coming and there didn’t seem to be anything I could do to stop them.
Men with blue rain shells that said FBI or POLICE on the back came in with M-16s. O’Bannon was with them. He saw Ellen Lang, and then he saw me, and he said, “You sonofabitch.”
I remember smiling. Then I passed out.
38
For one of the few times in my life, I thought wouldn’t it be grand if I smoked. I was in the Hollywood Presbyterian Emergency Room watching the nurses, one nurse in particular, and waiting for my elbow cast to dry. They had the cast held away from my body by a little metal and plastic brace. A kid waiting to get his lip stitched asked me how I’d busted it, and I said fighting spies loud enough for my nurse to hear. All I needed now was a London Fog slung casually over my shoulders and a cigarette dangling from my lip, and she’d probably rape me.
Poitras came though a set of swinging doors, with O’Bannon playing shadow. Poitras was big and blank and carrying two Styrofoam cups of coffee. They looked like thimbles in his hands. O’Bannon looked like he’d bitten into a Quarter-pounder and found an ear. Everyone in the waiting room stared at Poitras. Even the doctors. What a specimen.
“My,” I said. “What a delightful surprise.”
Poitras held out one of the coffees. “Black, right?”
“Black.”
The doctor had put three layers of tape around my ribs, splinted my hand, and given me an analgesic, but it still hurt to reach for the coffee. Driving would be an adventure.
“How’s the kid?” I said.
They’d found him hidden away in a closet on the first floor. He was still blindfolded and didn’t know what was happening. “Okay,” Lou said. “Cleaned up his hand, gave him some shots. You know. His mom took him down to the cafeteria. He wanted a hamburger.”
One of Duran’s thugs had put an ice pick through the boy’s hand to make him scream. I didn’t know who. With any luck I’d killed him. “You talk to him yet?”
“Mm-hmm.” Lou said, “You left a lot of bodies back there, Ace. Sorta like Rambo Goes To Hollywood.”
I nodded.
“Between you and Pike and Mrs. Lang, if we include the one in Griffith park, looks to be eleven stiffs.”
“Me and Pike. Mrs. Lang had nothing to do with it.”
“Yeah.”
