Lu shook his head.
'Too much blood loss,' he said. 'She died on the way to the hospital.'
The news didn't surprise her. Still, she had held out hope, and felt the loss at having it amputated twitch like a phantom limb.
After finding the stairs that led into the basement, she saw, through the windows, the backyard lit up by floodlights. Saw the frail woman with curly grey hair wearing a North Face parka lying sideways on the grass, screaming, her arthritic hands clutching the ripped meat of her bloody thigh. The puppies barked. They had gathered around the woman, four of them, maybe more, and they barked and licked her face and cuddled close to her body. And even in her excruciating pain, in fear and shock, Mavis Smith wanted to protect them. Tried to shoo them away towards the opened basement door underneath the balcony.
Darby found the light switch for the backyard lights and shut them off, knowing why the woman had been shot in the thigh: the sniper was using her as bait, trying to draw Darby out.
It worked. The woman screamed again. Darby tumbled against the grass fifteen feet away and ran. When she reached the edge of the backyard she turned and started firing blindly in the direction of the shots — the trees, the sniper had to be somewhere in those trees across the street, and she hoped the muzzle flashes would blind him momentarily. They had. With one hand she grabbed the parka's hood and kept firing as she dragged the screaming woman across the grass, kept firing until the magazine clicked empty. Darby locked the basement door and in the dim light stripped off the parka as the puppies barked outside, scratching their paws against the door, and the woman kept crying, 'I've got to call Paula, I've got to call Paula.'
Not two gunshot wounds but three. Mavis Smith had been shot in the chest, underneath her right breast. Darby used her belt as a tourniquet on the leg. Used a plastic garbage bag on the sucking chest wound, holding her fingers along three edges and keeping the fourth edge free so the chest could achieve its usual negative pressure state. She stayed with the woman, applying pressure as blood spurted through her fingers, urging the woman to stay calm. Mavis Smith whimpered 'Paula, I've got to call Paula' over and over again until the paramedics arrived.
Darby drank the water in one long, burning gulp, realizing her foolishness at having rushed blindly into the backyard. The sniper had had the advantage. He had been hidden somewhere in the trees and using a scope. She could have been shot. She could be lying dead on the ground right now while forensics took pictures of her body.
'How are the dogs?' she asked.
'Fine, not a scratch on them. We put them in the garage.'
'She kept talking about calling someone named Paula.'
'You told me that already.'
There was something off about Lu. Maybe the clothes had something to do with it. For some bizarre, unfathomable reason, the man had adopted the cartoonish attire seen in old American cop shows: a fedora and belted London Fog raincoat worn over a cheap navy-blue suit.
She held the empty glass by her side, wondering how Lu was going to play it. Only two choices: play it cool or come down on her hard.
'Any leads on the shooter?'
'We're canvassing the neighbourhood, speaking to people.' He sighed, then shook his head in frustration. 'So far, nobody's seen anyone heading into the woods carrying a sniper rifle.'
Darby stared at him. Did the man actually think someone would be carrying a fully assembled sniper rifle? Didn't he know that a sniper rifle was carried, disassembled, inside a small carrying pack that could be easily concealed underneath a jacket?
'What about spent brass?' she asked. 'You find any casings in the woods?'
'We found your shell casings all over the backyard.'
'I told you what happened. Three times.' There was no anger in her voice, just a calm, neutral matter-of-fact tone. 'What don't you understand?'
'You haven't explained who fired at you.'
'I don't know. I told you I didn't see him.'
'You said this person was using a rifle with a silencer and a scope.'
'That's right.'
'To know that, you must have seen him.'
'I'll tell it to you again,' she said. 'I didn't hear any of the shots. That means a silencer was used. To get off a headshot in this wind, to shoot Smith's wife twice in the leg, you'd need a scope. To tear Smith's head off his shoulders you'd need to use a high-powered rifle and ammo. I didn't see any muzzle flashes, so this person was using a flash suppressor, a common piece of equipment on a sniper rifle. All of these facts suggest a sniper. I didn't say anything about seeing the shooter.'
'You failed to mention that you're conducting an investigation.'
'That's because I'm not conducting one. I came here to speak to John Smith, catch up on old times. We worked together.'
'So I was told.'
Darby waited for the rest of it. She didn't take her eyes off Lu.
'I made some calls to Boston and spoke to a man named Leland Pratt. He told me that you no longer work for the Crime Services Unit — or the lab, for that matter. He asked me to relay a message to you.'
'Can I borrow a pen and a piece of paper? This sounds important.'
'Don't worry, it's short. He said don't bother coming to the lab to collect your things. They'll be mailed to you.'
'That's wonderful. Tell him thank you.'
A thin smile, and then Lu said, 'Mr Pratt indicated that you've involved yourself in an investigation. Care to tell me what it is?'
Darby thought of an old Ben Franklin epigram: One can keep a secret if two are dead. The only person who knew the real reason for her visit was John Smith and, possibly, his wife.
'I told you. Catching up.'
Lu popped a cherry LifeSaver on to his small, thin lips. 'An officer will escort you downtown. I'll speak to you later, when you're ready to tell me the truth.'
'The truth about what?'
'This investigation you're involved in, these people who followed you here and tried to kill you.'
Lu held his hand in the air and motioned to someone over her shoulder. She turned slightly and saw a patrolman, a big white dude who hadn't bought a new shirt to accommodate his expanding waistline and ample chins, walking towards her, cuffs in hand.
She turned back to Lu and, laughing, said, 'You can't be serious.'
'I am.'
'What's the charge?'
'You're carrying an illegal firearm.'
'I have a licence.'
'Not any more. Boston PD has since revoked it.'
'When?'
'Today. Mr Pratt told me.'
'This is the first I'm hearing about it.'
'You can discuss the matter with your attorney,' Lu said. 'You can make the call at the station, after you've been charged.'
41
