behind him. Another man made it far enough to kneel over his fallen comrade, then looked around him for someone to kill, before the rifle’s sights leveled on him too.
Inside the house they couldn’t tell what was happening. There had been shooting outside, and water coming from somewhere, but there was no way to put it together into a coherent idea that would tell them what to do. Somebody must be trying to put the fire out with the hose: he could tell that was what made sense to the two who rushed to the door next, because they weren’t armed. He let one of them get almost to the gas jet before he cut him down. The other stood inside the doorway, unaware that his companion was dead.
From his spot in the dark swimming pool, he decided to take a chance. He shouted, “Get the old man out!” then ducked down into the shadows and waited. There was the sound of movement inside the house and then he saw what he had been waiting for. A man in pajamas carefully eased a wheelchair into the doorway, and moved it out onto the patio. He aimed the rifle at the center of the chair’s back and prepared to squeeze a round into it. Then he sensed something was wrong. When the attendant got the chair to the patio he moved away from it toward the front of the house, his gun drawn. It wasn’t right. They wouldn’t leave the old man alone, no matter what happened. He studied the chair through his telescopic sights. There was something in it, but now he was sure it wasn’t the old man. Some hero? No, there were shoes on the footboard, but the leather back of the chair didn’t bulge in the right places. He thought quickly. It couldn’t be the front door. He could see that the front of the house was blazing now. There must be another way out. But where was it?
It had to be the garage. They’d want to get him away. The garage was behind him, too far to walk an invalid in an emergency. Suddenly it made sense. The place was built like a fortress, and yet the garage was a hundred yards away from the house. There had to be a tunnel under the yard. Then he realized that as soon as the ones who were left had made it to the garage, the old man would be driven away and then the floodlights would come on. He had to get out of the pool before they reached the safety of the garage.
He calmed himself and aimed at the only man he could see, the one in the doorway. He watched him fall backward. He dropped the rifle into the water and heaved himself out of the pool and began to sprint for the garage. He made it just as the electric door began to whir. He heard the car’s ignition, and then the dark shape of the car, its lights out, slid forward beside him, inching ahead behind the rising door. He froze and waited until the driver was abreast of him, then fired the pistol into his face. The car kept sliding slowly forward of its own volition, no living foot on its brake to halt it. When the back seat slid into view beside him he saw the old man’s face, held for an instant in a mask of surprise and terror like a photograph. When he squeezed the trigger the head jerked sideways as though it had been kicked. He walked along beside the drifting car and shot the old man twice more before he relinquished his place beside it.
He knew there would be only seconds now before someone turned on the lights. He sprinted for the nearest place the driveway ran along the wall and clambered over it. He didn’t look back, just kept running, turning the seconds of remaining darkness into whatever distance he could purchase. As he came to the end of the wall he saw a crouching shape waiting for him, both hands extended in front of it as though to steady a pistol. He heard the man shout something just before he fired into the crouching shape. The man’s gun went off in a last spasm of the fingers and he ran over the body before he realized that the man had said, “Hold it.” Hold it? Why would he say that? He kept running, but glanced back for an instant and realized the body was wearing a white shirt and tie under its coat. Strange, he thought. At three o’clock in the morning? But he didn’t have time to think about that. He was running hard along the house fronts. Behind him the floodlights went on and he heard the driverless car crash into something. When he reached the driveway where his car was parked, he jumped in, started it, and gave it as much gas as he dared without turning on the lights. In the rearview mirror he could see half the sky was lit up, a chaos of white floodlights and orange fire, and he could hear the first barking of guns back and forth across the deserted lawns and into the empty night. As he turned the corner and urged the car to fifty-five, he smiled to himself. He didn’t feel so angry now.
There was the climate-controlled humming tube of the airplane’s interior; and then the two stewardesses standing at their station next to the Formica kitchenette like a pair of dancers from the chorus line brought out for a last bow in front of the curtain; and then the white, searing sunshine of the Las Vegas Saturday morning. Elizabeth squinted as she stepped down the portable stairway, staring down at her feet to avoid a glaring sun that seemed to explode at her from every direction at once.
There were no knots of happy relatives waiting at the terminal entrance for the passengers to arrive— everyone was a stranger here—only sober-faced preoccupied porters. As she looked about her for some sign that would tell her where to find her suitcase, a man’s voice came over a loudspeaker.
“Elizabeth Waring, please come to the United Airlines Courtesy Desk, Elizabeth Waring. Elizabeth Waring, please come to the United Airlines Courtesy Desk, Elizabeth Waring.”
Brayer. No question about it, she thought. No doubt he’d forgotten to tell her something, and it wouldn’t occur to him to wait until she got to the hotel. She approached the desk, and said, “Elizabeth Waring.”
The man handed her a note, which said, “Please telephone John Brayer as soon as possible.” The please had to have been the airline’s amendment. She went to the bank of pay telephones on the wall across the lobby and dialed. He answered on the first ring.
“Something’s going on there, Elizabeth,” said Brayer. “I’m not sure yet what it is, but we’ve got an agent down.”
“Oh God,” said Elizabeth. “Are you sure? Who is it?”
“The Las Vegas police phoned a half hour ago. They found DiGiorgio this morning when they were going over a burned-out house. He’s alive, but there were five dead men in the yard, and they’re not sure if there were others inside.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Sit tight for a few minutes. There’ll be a police officer at the United desk to take you to the hospital. If they’ll let you talk to DiGiorgio find out what you can. If they won’t, get everything the police have and get back to me. When you’ve done that I should have a better idea. For the moment work through me. Don’t try to get in touch with any of the field agents. I don’t know what the hell is going on and I don’t want anybody spotted until I do.”
“John,” said Elizabeth, “I see the policeman at the desk now. I’d better get going.”
“Fine. Get back to me when you can. We’ve got people all over Las Vegas and if they’re in danger we’ve got to know it.”
Elizabeth hung up and moved toward the desk just as the policeman turned to approach her. “I’m Waring,” she said. The policeman nodded and touched the polished brim of his hat as they set off toward the door. He was tall and his first two strides left her a yard behind.
“My luggage,” she said apologetically. “I haven’t picked it up.”
“Where are you staying?” he asked.
“The Sands.”
He looked a little surprised, but said, “If you’ll give me your stub I’ll have it sent on.” He returned to the desk and gave the stub to the United man. He joined her at the curb outside, where his patrol car sat idling, its front door open and the radio squawking and sizzling.
She got in beside him and he swung out into the drive. “How’s DiGiorgio?” she asked.
“Critical,” said the policeman, his face stony. She decided that he didn’t like women, but that it didn’t matter whether he did or not, so she forgot about it. “He lost a lot of blood before they found him. Upper chest. One shot from close up, small caliber.”
Elizabeth thought about it for a moment, but it didn’t mean much. “Does anybody know what happened?”
The policeman’s eyes shifted to her face for an instant, then flickered back to the road. “We’d hoped you might help us there, ma’am.” There it was again, she thought. The exaggerated politeness reserved for outsiders. Outsiders and women. “He’s your man.” It sounded like a reproof.
“He was assigned to surveillance,” she said. “But it was supposed to be remote. He wouldn’t have initiated any contact.”
