And they were guarded. Two guys, one leaning his back against a gate and the other leaning against the night watchman’s Volkswagen. They were both smoking, the small dull red dots marking them in the darkness. Though they could be seen anyway, silhouetted against the faint light from a streetlight somewhere outside the park.
Could they both be taken? That would be the simplest. Go get the satchel of money, come back, shoot both of these guys, take off.
No. They were pros, those two, nobody would sneak up on them that easily. They looked casual, standing there, leaning, smoking, but they were so fixed that they could watch each other’s back. No, the odds weren’t good. They weren’t the ones to go after yet, not yet.
He faded back again, past the little office, around that building and between it and Marooned! to the Desert Island snack bar. After that he had an open stretch to cross, the four guys arguing at the fountain down to his left and the two guys guarding the gate to his right, but the night was dark enough to cover him. He trotted across to the Island Earth area, past its black-light ride — Voyage Through the Galaxy — and on into Pleasure Island. He passed the carousel, went through Hawaii and Alcatraz and finally to Treasure Island, and there were no more of the invaders. Just six, the four at the fountain, and the two by the gates. And he had four bullets left.
Those at the fountain had apparently settled the question of whether or not to call Lozini. They would not. They were discussing tactics now, and blaming each other for the delay so far.
Up at the rear of Treasure Island was the black-light ride called Buccaneer! Parker went up there, feeling his way along in the darkness, found the side entrance he’d forced before, and went in. Once inside he switched on his flashlight, and there was everything as he remembered it. The little pirate ships stacked up to his left, near the control panel. The water running through the metal trough winding back and forth inside the building past the displays. Parker went along the narrow catwalk to the display where he’d altered the wiring earlier today, and plugged it in, then went back to the front again and looked outside.
They were still down there, still talking things over. They seemed to think they had forever. They took hours to come in here after him, and once inside, all they did was stand around and talk.
It was time to get them moving again. Parker went to the control panel and threw the master switch.
Once again, lights and music. Sea-shanty music this time, and deep bass laughter, and recorded comments like “Heave ho, me hearties” and “Make ‘em walk the plank!” And the usual whirling lights outside, clamoring for attention.
They’d get it, too. Parker went out the side door, and saw the flashlights bobbing in this direction. Off to his right the high shape of the pirate ship in its own small lake loomed white and ghostly out of the darkness. Parker ran for that, crouched low, got to the gangplank, ran up it, and ducked behind the railing on deck.
He peered around the edge of the railing, and saw two of them rush inside. Only two? Where were the rest?
He ought to get farther away from here. There was another gangplank on the other side of the ship, and he headed for it, moving slowly and cautiously across the deck and around the main cabin.
He glanced back, over at Buccaneer! The two had gone inside now. How long would it take? Sooner or later one of them would touch the wrong thing. If he was also touching the water at the same time — There was a sudden yowl from inside the building, like a hound who’d just been shot. Parker looked, and the lights across the face of the building were flickering, the music was suddenly dragging, speeding up, dragging, speeding up. The yowl stretched out, and slowly died away.
He nodded, and turned for the gangplank again, and there was suddenly somebody standing there, half-visible in the flickering light from Buccaneer!
The cop.
There wasn’t time for anything. Parker reached to his jacket pocket for his gun, but the cop jumped forward, throwing his arms around him, trying to wrestle him to the ground. Parker got a foot around his ankle, shoved him off-balance, and the cop fell back, but came in again right away, swinging a long right at Parker’s forehead.
Parker went in under the punch, driving both hands at the cop’s belly, and the cop grabbed him again, trying for a bear hug, wrestling him around.
The cop was strong, and besides that, he’d panicked. Parker could hear the strangled breath in his ear, he could hear how frightened the cop was. So much that he’d forgotten his gun, he wasn’t even trying for it. So much that he wasn’t even shouting to his friends, wasn’t making any noise at all except for that panicky loud breathing.
The two of them were shoving and swaying back and forth across the deck, and as they did so, darkness suddenly fell again, as the light and sound of Buccaneer! abruptly cut off. In pitch-darkness Parker and the cop kept wrestling, struggling with one another, and then suddenly there was nothing beneath Parker’s feet any more, the whole world was turning upside-down, and the two of them crashed into the icy water beside the ship.
The shock of the cold water broke their grip. Parker almost lost consciousness for a second, but managed to keep awake, to keep in motion. He’d lost the cop somewhere, but that didn’t matter. He struggled to his feet in knee-deep water, put his hand out, felt the wooden side of the ship, waded heavily the other way and came out to snow-covered blacktop.
Behind him the cop was suddenly shouting. “He’s here! Over this way! He’s here!”
Parker ran heavily away, already starting to shake inside the wet clothes.
Three
HE WAS shivering so much he could hardly stand, the tremors shaking him back and forth like a drunk. His clothing was heavy with icy water, weighing him down. He felt dizzy, faint, he had a compelling urge to just drop, fall down where he was and forget everything. Close his eyes, quit fighting, let the shivering take him, just lie there like a wounded cat until they came to put him out of his misery.
But he wouldn’t do it, he wouldn’t stop. To keep his teeth from chattering he had his jaw clenched so tight the ache of it ran through his head as though he’d been beaten with nightsticks. But he kept moving, kept putting one foot in front of the other, though his shoes now felt like blocks of ice weighing down his feet.
He was in New York Island again, staggering along the fake cobblestones past the little shops. There was no one chasing him right now, but he didn’t know how long he had. He had to get to ground, he had to get dry, he had to get warm, he had to survive.
