“How many times do I have to remind you that I’m an optimist?”
“So were the ones who died trying to fly before the Wright Brothers found the secret.”
“Just get the papers ready.”
“When do you plan to, er, confront them? It isn’t really necessary, you know.”
“Ah, but it is. And I want to go all the way with it. There’s still Cousin Alfred.”
“I see.”
“Saturday night, Counselor?”
“Very well.”
“You make the arrangements.”
Hunter nodded, looked at me several seconds, then said, “Do you think you’ll have time to enjoy your triumph. Dog?”
“I’ve lived this long,” I told him. “Survival’s a matter of being the fittest.”
I took the old road out of town, deliberately circumnavigating the Barrin factory where the battery of Klieg lights set up for the night scenes glowed like a yellow umbrella over a normally darkened area. A generation ago it would have been a normal sight, the floods ringing the buildings making Barrin the bright heart of the city. Now it was almost like the last gasp of a dying fish.
Twice, I cut my lights before making turns, taking no chances on being followed. I had trailed too many cars myself under blackout conditions, guiding myself by the taillights ahead, completely out of sight of the lead car, and I didn’t want it done to me. To double check I stopped twice too, waiting to see if anything went by me. Nothing did so I picked up the road leading out to Lucy Longstreet’s retreat, picking out the landmarks through the metronome clicks of the windshield wipers.
When I reached it I eased into the driveway, cut the engine and went up and banged on the door. Nobody answered, so I waited a few seconds, knocked again and heard Lucy’s raucous voice holler for me to come on in.
She was sitting by herself at a card table with a Scrabble game half finished, an empty coffee cup beside her, looking annoyed as hell. “Lose your partner?” I asked her.
“Temporarily. It ain’t much fun playing alone, so sit down, Johnny.” She reached her leg out under the table and kicked the chair out for me, squinted at me impatiently and said, “Let me get this word down and you can play too.”
There was something about her that wasn’t hanging right and when she picked four tiles out of the holder and laid them down it made a lousy job of Scrabble but a good piece of explanation. The word didn’t fit, but it was clear enough. It spelled out
And Lucy Longstreet had been around long enough to anticipate all the moves and when I was hurtling off the chair she was sliding for the floor as feet pounded through the doorway behind me. I had the .45 out and blasted the overhead light out with the first shot before a foot took the rod out of hand and sent it skittering across the room. But the odds weren’t all that bad anymore. Anyone I touched was the enemy and they had to identify me personally. And the first one tripped over me into a ball of knuckles that put his teeth down his throat and left my fist slimy with blood. When he crashed into the wall I was rolling to the left, my arm sweeping out to yank the legs of another one out from under him. The gun in his hand blasted a swath of light into my face, hot, stinging powder etching a burn across my cheek. My hand grabbed the gun in his fingers, my other hand getting leverage on his elbow and I broke his wrist with a single twist and smashed the scream out of his throat when I backhanded the iron across his skull.
There just wasn’t enough time. I saw the shadow looming above me and spotted the movement, so long- conditioned reflexes jerked my head aside and let padded metal ricochet off my temple in a blinding wave of pain and lights. I tried to move, but nothing worked at all and I knew that it was all over because the flickering glow of a cigarette lighter snapped on and there was enough peripheral vision left to see the outline of an automatic in it.
I knew I let out a weak curse when the crash came and all I could think of was that it was the silliest noise I ever heard a gun make and dying wasn’t so bad after all if it could distort sounds like that and not even let you feel the agony of a bullet at all. No pain. Just a heavy, crushing weight that pressed down and down and down.
When the light went on I blinked the tears out of my eyes and through the ringing in my ears I heard Lucy Longstreet say, “You okay, kid?”
“Shit.”
“Do that later. Right now get out from under that clown. He’s dripping blood all over you.”
I heaved up on my knees and felt the body roll off my back, got to my feet and looked at the mess on the floor. They were all alive and breathing, but pretty damn sick, especially the one Lucy had damn near brained with the old-fashioned lamp that used to be the centerpiece of her whorehouse parlor table.
I took a minute to catch my breath, then took a good look at the three of them. Two I had never seen before, but one was an old-time buddy. Now he had a broken wrist and one hell of a dent in his skull. Blackie Saunders, the wipeout boy from Trenton was going to have a hard time explaining all this to Chet Linden.
Chet was going to have an even harder time explaining this to me.
The cigar Lucy was trying to light had broken halfway down its length and didn’t want to take hold. She spat it out angrily and felt in her pocket for another one. When she got it fired she gave me a twisted grin. “Like the old days, kid. You know them?”
“I know where they came from. What happened?”
She gave a shrug as if it had been an everyday occurrence. “Came in about two hours ago. Scared the living crap out of Beth and the boys.”
“What boys?”
“Old Stanley Cramer and Stoney. Beth had ’em out hustlin’ for some dirt on your cousin. They come up with some goodies, too. He got to one of the girls who was scragged and she gave him a detailed letter.”
“They all right?”
“Sure. Tied up out in the kitchen.”
“Look, Lucy ... don’t give it to me in episodes I havent got ...”
“Relay, sonny. First tell me what we’re gonna do with these buckos. If you want I still got contacts who’ll. . . ”
“Forget it.” I pushed past her and in five minutes I had all three of them wrapped up and gagged so tight they wouldn’t be going anywhere unless I let them. I found my own rod, tucked it away, then pushed Lucy down into a chair. “Okay, Lucy, now all of it.”
She nodded toward Blackie and puffed on the cigar. “That one liked to talk. He had a mad on for you, Doggie boy. Seems like they been in town checking out every one of your acquaintances and didn’t have any luck until he heard old Juke telling Tod about seeing you and what a nice guy you was and how they had something to give you. Juke, he just rambled on and said they was coming here and then call you. Later, Stanley and Stoney came in, sent Juke somewhere on an errand and they followed the boys back.”
“I didn’t get any call.”
“Not like they didn’t try to get one through.”
“I haven’t been in any one place very long.”
“That’s what they figured too. So they decided to wait. Hell, after they put the others in the kitchen that one I busted over there even played some Scrabble with me. The dirty bastard used words that wasn’t in the rules and made me play ’em. I should’ve really laid it on. You know what that lamp cost me?”
“Ten bucks.”
“Yeah, but a dollar was a dollar then.”
I threw her a disgusted smile and shook my head. “Let’s get them out of the kitchen.”
Beth’s fright had turned to total indignation and she was all for throwing a pail of scalding water over the three of them. I talked her out of it and let her settle for kicking each one in the head and enjoying the muffled groans that seeped through the gags. Cramer and Stoney didn’t want any part of them and had to have a few belts of Lucy’s best Scotch before they could get the shake out of their hands. I had to prod Stoney into remembering where he put the letter he had and he finally dug it out of an old jacket that had been slung across the back of a chair.
