All he could see of the dancer was one leg. A shard of mirror the size and shape of a pizza slice was embedded in her thigh, its shiny surface obliterated by a pulsing gout of arterial blood. The man paled, raced for the door and clattered down the stairs toward the street shouting hysterically.
Across the alley and down the block rose one of the taller buildings in the neighborhood. It was vacant save for a janitorial staff scattered over several floors. As the patrons of Crazy Lil’s joined the hysterical employee on the adjacent street, a small tunnel was punctured in the rear corner of the building where the left side and rear walls joined. This tunnel proceeded rapidly but methodically down through the wall passing with equal ease through concrete and reinforcing bars.
A minute or so passed uneventfully, then fractures began to radiate from the tunnel into the surrounding concrete. The building settled slightly, amplifying the unequal distribution of stress along the wound and increasing the rate of fracturing.
Inside, in a corner of the building, a weary man guided a buffing machine slowly back and forth. He stopped suddenly as he felt a shift in the floor. The unguided buffing machine dug more heavily on one side and skittered away from him. He grabbed for it and quickly shut it off. He stood, listened and felt through his feet the barely perceptible vibrations of rupturing concrete.
He shuffled out of the office into the hallway. He stopped and felt with his feet again and sensed nothing.
“Hey, Harold!”
A young man working with a mop on the floor at the far end of the corridor looked up.
“C’mon down here. There’s sumpin’ funny goin’ on.”
The old man led the younger one into the office and stood him in the corner. They stared at one another as each felt the minute vibrations emanating from the weakened corner. Suddenly, a portion of the rear wall sagged a quarter of an inch. A jagged crack raced from the corner of the room to the windowsill. The window glass shattered; some pieces fell inward; others made the longer plunge to the alley below.
Harold shouted.
“Hey! This mother’s comin’ apart!”
He raced for the door. The old man followed him in a lumbering jog.
“Harold, you’re faster than I am. You get upstairs and warn the folks there. I’ll head down.”
Harold spun to a stop’ and stared hard at the old man. After a long moment he nodded and pushed through the exit door into the stairway and headed up three steps at a time. The old man followed him and two-stepped downward.
A block away, Glen Wilson and Sam Spangler had joined the crowd that stood a discreet distance from the man who had run, shouting into the street. Now the man was pacing nervously about, mumbling incoherently. Patrons of the strip joint babbled to one another or to passers-by about what had happened. People from the Poodle Lounge below anxiously explained their disruption to whoever would listen. Wilson tried to absorb these several conversations at once. As they had crossed the street, he had heard the returning echo of the whistling roar that had preceded the commotion. The sound had vanished in an ill-determined direction, but he also listened for some repercussion.
Finally, he heard the muted crashes as large chunks of masonry began to break away from the other building, crashing into the alley. He grabbed his partner’s arm and led him off down the street in the general direction of the sound.
As they reached the nearest intersection, they heard from around the corner the terrifying roar as the rear quarter of the building gave way. Portions of the rear and side walls peeled away to expose the multilayered innards of the building as if it were a large misshapened doll house.
The two agents froze at the corner until the noise died away and then walked to the alley and peered down it toward the ruined building. Even in the dim light they could see the huge pile of rubble reaching above the second floor, torn chunks of concrete interspersed with crushed office furniture. Soon they were joined by others from the crowd in front of the strip joint.
The agents edged out of the crowd. Wilson began to start back toward the bar, but Spangler gestured in the opposite direction, and they walked to the intersection and turned.
They passed in front of the damaged building. The only sign of disturbance from this aspect was the group of a dozen or so janitorial workers who huddled nervously in the street, some talking loudly, many standing silent, a few still conspicuously clutching their brooms and mops.
The agents continued on around the block. Back on the first street they returned to their car. A squad car was parked in front of the strip joint entrance. From a distance, the wail of approaching sirens could be heard. The crowd had grown. They got in the car. Wilson put the key in the ignition, but paused before he turned it. He looked at his partner.
“What in god’s name do you suppose that was?”
Spangler was slumped down in his seat, staring straight ahead.
“Beats the living hell out of me. Never seen anything like it.”
“This ought to get headquarters lathered up. I have a feeling the boss was hoping nothing would happen, but now they’re going to want some physical evidence. From that collapsed building for sure, probably in that bar, too. I hope the locals don’t go mucking around and mess something up. No sense talking to the beat cop over there, but it’s not our business to go higher up. I hate to play dumb bunny, but I guess we need to call home for orders.”
“I need something,” Spangler growled. “Jesus!”
Wilson cranked the key and headed for the motel room they had rented out toward the airport.
Four days later, on a waning Friday afternoon, Vincent Martinelli hosted Isaacs for a celebratory drink. He put the bottle on the little bar built in behind his desk then swiveled in his chair and hoisted his double scotch and soda.
“L’chaim!”
The turning point in Nagasaki flashed in Isaacs’ mind.
“Kampai,” he said, returning the salute.
“Well, son-of-a-bitch, Bob,” Martinelli said. “Maybe old man Drefke’s not a complete knucklehead after all. For a while there I thought I was going to have to look for a new career, Kelly Girl or some such thing.”
Isaacs grinned. “I’ll tell you it was a relief to me when he agreed to read my memo. Up to that point he could easily have just said screw it and tossed the lot of us out.”
“Seriously,” Martinelli said, “I appreciate everything you did to save my butt.”
“For god’s sake, Vince, I got you into it.”
“I’m a big boy, I knew what I was doing. I appreciate you going to bat for me.”
“Well, I shouldn’t have gotten you involved. I’m relieved we got out okay.” They both stared into their drinks, a little embarrassed by this open exchange of gratitude.
Then Martinelli strove to recapture the spirit of celebration. “So how is friend McMasters taking all this?” he inquired in a jovial tone.
“He’s sulking.”
“Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.”
They both chuckled.
“It really backfired on him,” Isaacs mused. “Not only did he not get me booted, but now Drefke’s made the whole investigation top priority and put me in charge. That’s really going to hurt him.”
“I don’t suppose it’s too much to hope that a little luster’s gone off his star?”
“My reading is that Drefke still appreciates his ability to run internal affairs, but he sees him in a different light now. McMasters had some rationale to argue Project QUAKER wasn’t agency business, but his forbidding me to work on it and then having me shadowed don’t look too hot in hindsight.”
“Ah, another toast then. To the future Deputy Director of Intelligence.” Martinelli raised his glass to Isaacs.
“C’mon, Vince,” Isaacs protested.
“You know it’s true.”
Isaacs was pleased, but embarrassed again. He recognized the timetable for his promotion had probably
