thought was the custody of agent Kamin. Doyle had no idea how this mix-up had occurred, but he didn’t like what he was seeing. He felt his stomach tighten as Mortvedt glared at him.
Never looking either back or upward, Mortvedt began to move purposefully toward Doyle across the twenty feet that divided them. His progress was remarkably unhurried.
“You’re not gettin’ away with what you done to me, mister,” Mortvedt said as he advanced, fists clenched. “You got somethin’ comin’ from me.”
Doyle pivoted to run, not from Mortvedt but from the onrushing balloon he could see dropping from the sky behind the little man. It was headed directly for the winner’s circle. In a reflex action that he would later chide himself for, Doyle shouted to Mortvedt, “Look out, look out, it’s coming right at you….”
So determined was he to reach the man responsible for his capture, Ronald Mortvedt did not heed Jack Doyle’s warning, never looked up at the out-of-control, brightly colored vehicle that was plummeting directly toward him.
The platform of General Oscar Belliard’s balloon landed on Ronald Mortvedt like an elevator car cut loose from its cables. The impact of one of the balloon’s two propane tanks hitting Mortvedt’s head made a horrible thunking noise. Immediately, the balloon bounced back up into the air. Beneath it Mortvedt lay face down, the back of his head crumpled. His left cheek had been nearly ripped off, and the blood from that wound spread on the ground. Nearby, grooms struggled to control the two terrified horses that were attempting to back away from the scene.
As the balloon rose, Wanda Marchik leaned out of the wicker basket, making a series of soprano whoops the content of which no one on the ground could make out. However, two of the FBI agents and a groom leaped forward to grab the line she’d dropped from the balloon. Junior Kozol unleashed another line from the other side, and that too was snatched by helpful bystanders. Tugging mightily, they combined to haul the balloon back to earth. Its wicker platform settled directly atop Ronald Mortvedt.
The only part of Mortvedt now visible was his left foot, encased in a small black boot that protruded from under the balloon wreckage. The Marchiks and Junior Kozol remained enwrapped in the ravaged envelope of the balloon as track workers rushed to extricate them.
Karen Engel ran forward from the paddock tunnel, her face pale.
“My God, Jack,” she said, “it looks just like
“He had all of that coming, and more.”
Chapter 37
Karen Engel’s assessment of Ronald Mortvedt’s prospects was accurate. The little ex-jockey was pronounced DOA at Western Community Hospital five miles from Heartland Downs, victim of massive head injuries.
Passengers in the killer balloon, the
Tough nut that she was, Wanda Marchik escaped with various minor bruises, as did Junior Kozol. Red Marchik, however, somehow managed to pull both an Achilles tendon and a groin muscle during the disastrous descent. Even as paramedics hefted him on a stretcher into the ambulance, Red was raving about lawsuits he intended to file.
“Settle down, honey,” Wanda told Red as she slid into the ambulance beside him, “let’s first get you fixed up and comfortable.” Wanda patted her husband’s hand. Then she said, “Wonder what the Sports Preacher would make out of all that happened here today?”
Jack Doyle sat at the end of the long mahogany bar of O’Keefe’s Ale House, watching television’s ten o’clock news. All the Chicago channels had received-courtesy of the Heartland Downs television department-excellent footage of the Derby and its memorable winner’s circle aftermath.
Doyle grinned as he watched himself sidestep and dodge, his old AAU footwork standing him in good stead again, as the balloon dealt its death blow to Ronald Mortvedt.
“Sheila, Bushmills Manhattan, please,” Doyle called to the busy barmaid, another immigrant from County Cork. Her name was Sheila Maloney, and she was bright, friendly, and considerably better looking than her predecessor, Maureen Hoban. And Doyle was determined to keep a tremendous distance between them, having decided he’d had enough dealings with women from Cork.
An hour earlier, when he arrived at O’Keefe’s, Doyle had used his government-issued cell phone to call Karen Engel at the Chicago FBI office for an update. They’d become separated in the tremendous confusion that followed the balloon crash, and Doyle had departed the track unclear about some matters, except the main one-he was off the hook with the FBI.
“You did a great job, Jack,” Damon had emphasized. Both he and Karen had hurriedly thanked Doyle before they left, looking as if they meant it.
On the phone, Karen reported that Rexroth and Stoner had both been charged that evening before a federal magistrate and would be held at least until Monday morning, when bonds could be set.
“I talked to Ronald Mortvedt’s aunt down in Louisiana,” Karen added, “Alice Cormier. She was the only relative of his we knew how to find. Alice wasn’t surprised at what had happened to Ronnie, but it hurt her anyway. I hate making those calls.”
“Why doesn’t Damon make them?”
Karen said, “He hates it worse than I do.”
Doyle shifted his cell phone from one hand to the other as he prepared to take out his wallet and pay his bar bill.
“Who the hell were those goofs in the balloon?”
“They were carrying out some kind of protest against Harvey Rexroth,” Karen replied. “People named Marchik, husband and wife, they made these streamers attacking Rexroth. They’ve got a beef against Rexroth for his firing of Mr. Marchik down in Kentucky. At least I guess that was their motive. It’s kind of hard to figure what the Marchiks are about. But the crash was certainly not their fault-it happened because the pilot passed out. That’s as much as we’ve gotten out of them.
“It wasn’t their balloon,” Karen continued. “The balloon’s pilot and owner is a friend of theirs. The Marchiks know him from some off-brand, so-called militia group they all belong to in Louisville. Apparently the pilot-he calls himself ‘General’ Belliard, no less-had a slight heart attack in the course of the flight.”
Doyle said, “I’m starting to get a headache. You’re saying Merchuck or Marcik or whatever his name is gets fired from RexCom, then winds up crashing a balloon at the racetrack on the same day we’re reeling in Harvey Rexroth? I don’t think I can listen to any more of this.”
Trying to ignore Sheila Maloney, who was chattering to him from the other side of the bar in her faux Irish colleen costume, Doyle took a swallow of his drink. Sheila leaned over the mahogany, giving Doyle a cleavage show and a dimpled smile. Doyle resolved to advise Sheila and whatever Cork cuties succeeded her not to try so hard.
Doyle said to Karen, “What about Mortvedt? What are they going to do with him, bury him with a stake in his heart?”
“That’s not funny, Jack,” Karen said. “I know how we all feel about Mortvedt, you especially, but still, there’s a limit….” She broke off that thought, well aware of her unreceptive audience of one.
“Actually,” Karen said, “we’re shipping Mortvedt’s ashes down to Louisiana. Alice Cormier said she’d pay for him to be cremated. Said she couldn’t afford the cost of embalming, or a coffin.”
Doyle watched the ice cubes wobble around the half-finished drink that he started to lift, then put down on the bar. He didn’t know Alice Cormier, but he could feel sorry for her. He sure as hell had known Ronald Mortvedt, and he felt no sorrow whatsoever for him. In fact, he thought to himself, maybe they’ll scatter the little bastard’s ashes in one of those Cajun specialties full of other bottom feeders. They could call it Gumbo Diablo.
