Rogers was not used to operational work. It had been years since he had been in the field, preferring instead his duties as a high-level administrator and Washington liaison. This mission was considered so important, though, that he had insisted on being in on it Hunter knew that adventure was not Roger’s motive. The man simply wanted the prestige that would be attached to nabbing such a high profile criminal. Hunter did not begrudge him this.
“Well, where’s Ironman?” Rogers asked in a low, nervous voice. “He should have been here by now. You sure he’s going to fall for this?”
“I don’t think he has any choice,” Hunter answered, keeping his eyes on the entranceway through which Ironman would come. “So long as he thinks Kristin can testify against him, he’s got to destroy those records before the tax people come for them.”
“And you made sure he knows the tax people are coming in the morning, right?”
Hunter nodded. “I let it leak out through the usual channels. And then, just to be sure, I made a point of letting it slip out while I was talking to that informer of Ironman’s. That way, word of it is sure to get back to Ironman.”
“Yes,” said Rogers, pursing his lips judiciously, “that certainly should have done it.”
The informer they were talking about was one of the federal agents who had very recently turned corrupt after succumbing to a large bribe Ironman had offered him. The man relayed back to Ironman information from within the department. Hunter and Rogers knew about him due to surveillance they had started as a result of Hunter’s suspicions about the man’s weakness for money. But instead of arresting the turncoat, they had decided to use him. Whenever they wanted false information fed to Ironman, they just discussed it when the spy was present in the room. The spy then relayed it, believing it to be genuine information.
“As soon as we bust Ironman,” Rogers said bitterly, “let’s take this turncoat out, too, and put him in jail where he belongs. It rankles me to have a man like that in my department, even though he’s useful at the moment.”
Hunter glanced at him, then turned his eyes back to the front. “I’ll go along with that. We won’t need Joel once Ironman’s out of the picture.”
“Joel,” repeated Rogers, with disgust. “Lee Joel. The damn turncoat!”
Hunter looked at his watch. He was becoming restless too. Where was Ironman? He should have been here by now. Hunter had a command post outside, hidden away in a storefront across the street. He debated whether to go out to check on recent intelligence reports. Crossing the street was a risk, since Ironman might have a plant in the area, watching to see if there was any unusual activity near the warehouse. Finally he decided it was worth the risk.
“Stay here,” he said to Rogers. “I want to check across the street. I’ll only be gone a minute. If our boy does show up, though, you just stay put. Don’t try anything fancy until I get back. Right?”
“Sure, boss,” said Rogers with good-natured sarcasm.
Hunter left the warehouse, glanced up and down the street and crossed over to the storefront. Six heavily armed men were inside, waiting to assault Ironman, if needed, at the first sound of gunfire.
“Any news?” Hunter asked Sampson, his man in charge of the command post. Sampson had earlier been planted aboard the Kristy as a blackjack dealer. When Kristin had left the ship to McShane, though, Sampson was recalled to active field duty.
“A call is coming in right now,” Sampson said, jerking his head to one of his men who had just picked up the receiver. “Probably nothing important. Usually isn’t. Other than that, no news at all. I don’t know what’s holding him up. Maybe he stopped at an orphanage along the way to donate some poisoned candy to the little kids.”
Hunter was about to respond, when his attention was attracted to a pockmarked man in the corner. The man was eagerly eyeing him, anxious to speak. His face was sweaty and distraught.
“Peters!” Hunter said, astonished. “What are you doing here?”
“I’ve been trying to get to you, Dallas!” the man exclaimed with relief. He came out of the corner and went up to Hunter, now that Hunter had noticed him and it was all right for him to speak. “I got here about fifteen minutes ago, when I found out from headquarters where you were. But Sampson wouldn’t let me go in to talk to you.”
“Sampson did right. I left orders that no one was to come in unless it was with information about Ironman’s arrival.”
Sampson repeated to Peters what he had told him earlier. “We can’t have people going back and forth across the street. They could have a plant out there. It would risk blowing the whole operation.”
Hunter asked in an urgent voice, “Peters, what are you doing here? You were supposed to be on the train with Kristin. I put you on there to protect her, to make sure she got to California safely. How’d you get back so quickly?”
“Dallas, she ditched me! At Chambers! I tore that train apart trying to follow her when she tried to lose me. Then I saw her outside the train, but the train was going too fast for me to jump! The conductor told me later that she’d been asking about getting a ticket back to New York.”
Hunter gritted his teeth with sudden anger. The anger was not directed at Peters, whose pockmarked face already showed his guilt at having failed. Hunter cursed. So Kristin was on the loose. She was not safe and secure in California. She was not out of the picture. There was only one reason she’d leave the train and return to New York. She intended to strike back at Ironman herself.
Hunter drew in a deep breath through his gritted teeth and shook his head at his own stupidity. He should have known. She was somehow involved in this ... in Ironman’s not falling into his trap as planned. He could feel it in his bones.
“Hey, Dallas,” said Sampson.
Hunter looked at him.
“New info.” He gestured at the bespectacled man who had answered the telephone. “Tell him, Quail.” “Sir, I’ve got Antonio Georgio on the line. The agent you stationed at the dock to watch the comings and goings aboard the Daisy? he says Ironman pulled up with Riggio and two men. He didn’t go to the Daisy though. He went over to the old amusement park on the pier.”
Hunter lunged for the receiver and grabbed it out of Quail’s hand. “Georgio? This is Hunter. Did a girl show up and go over to that amusement park? A blonde, very sharp-looking?”
“No, sir,” came the tinny voice over the line. “Only ones gone over to the pier is Ironman and three goons, like I told Quail. The pier’s closed down at night.” “Listen close. You stay right there, at your post. You see a blond girl go into that amusement park, or anywhere near it, you call back here right away. Understand?” He hung up and turned to Sampson. “If Georgio calls back and says Kristin is there, you send every man you’ve got out to that pier on the double. I’m going down there right now.”
Sampson looked confused. “Why don’t we just come with you now?”
“If she’s not involved in this, there’s no need for it. We’d blow this whole operation by showing up in force. Ironman would know we’re scheming on him. No, you and the others stay here. There’s still a good chance Ironman will show up here after he leaves the pier.” “What do you think he’s doing down there?” Sampson asked, scratching his chin.
“That’s what I’m going to find out. You tell Rogers everything I said.” Hunter started for the door, then turned back swiftly and pointed a finger toward Sampson’s chest. “Just make sure that if Georgio calls and says Kristin is at the pier, you send down everyone you’ve got. I don’t want her to get hurt. Understand? We take no chances on this girl’s life, even if it means blowing the whole mission.”
“Got you, boss.”
Hunter ran down the street to the black Ford parked at the curb a few stores away. He screeched off toward the waterfront.
CHAPTER 31
When Kristin arrived at the deserted amusement park on the pier, she did not leave her taxi. As per the instructions Agent Joel had given her, she remained inside, hunkere
d down low in the seat so she could not be seen from outside. She waited. Soon, another taxi pulled up alongside. She watched as Joel disembarked, paid his cabby and sent the taxi off on its way.
He held her door open for her. Kristin looked about cautiously before getting out. The pier was bathed in a misty fog. There were no lights of any kind, but the moon was full, and it diffused through the fog, illuminating the ramshackle amusement park nearby. She stood with Joel, watching her cab depart. She put her hands into the pockets of her fur coat, which was belted tightly at her waist.
“Is ... is everything all set?” she asked tentatively. “Trust me, lady. I’ve got federal agents all up and down this pier.”
“Ironman is in there?” she asked, indicating the deserted, forbidding-looking amusement park.
“Ready and waiting.” Joel looked at her sharply. “What’s the matter, you getting cold feet? It was your idea to set the trap this way, with you as bait. This is your big chance to get him, like you want.”
“I know.” She stared at the splintered wooden gate that in the past had stood at the amusement park entrance, but which had long since been beaten down by vagrants and trespassers. “I just wish I could feel more confident about this whole thing.”
“Look. I told you, I got agents everywhere in there. You can trust me. Want a sample? Here, watch this.”
He pointed at a broken-down jumble of pylons and pieces of cut timber far across the pier near the other side. These had once been collection booths from which tickets had been sold to the public when the amusement park was in operation. “Hey!” Joel called out. “Hey! Come on.”
From behind the pylons a head tentatively poked up. It was a man whose expression was stunned. He obviously didn’t expect to be called into the open like this. Seeing the man made Kristin feel reassured. So federal agents were all over the area, after all, she thought.
“You go through the gate and keep walking forward,” said Joel. “There’s only one street, and you walk down it. You’ll meet Ironman, like you want. I can’t go with you, of course. If he saw an agent, it would ruin everything.”
Kristin took a deep breath, braced herself emotionally, then started forward.
“My men will pop out of the woodwork the second they’re needed,” Joel said to her reassuringly as she entered the darkness of the park. “And then we’ll bust him, or kill him if he tries to harm you.”
Joel watched her disappear inside the gate, then quickly turned around and headed toward Agent Antonio Georgio, who was still behind the pilings. Georgio watched him coming, puzzled by this new twist in the plan. He did not know much about Joel, only that he had been instructed not to discuss any classified information with him. He was amazed that the agent would turn up here like this. He was not surprised Joel knew he was stationed behind the piling though. It was common knowledge that all of Ironman’s major points of arrival and departure were under constant surveillance. And this pier from which he often embarked for the Daisy, offshore, was one of the main points.
“What are you doing here?” Antonio Georgio asked Joel in an irritated voice. “And why did you point me out to her like that? I’m on covert reconnaissance. Covert, get it? No outsider is supposed to know I’m here.” “I was sent here to help you out,” Joel said.
Georgio looked at him warily. “Well, I don’t know about that.” He paused. “I’ve got to report. They want to know about the girl arriving. If you want to help out, you stay here and keep watch. I’m going over there.” He pointed down the pier to the area used as a demarcation point for skiffs. A lone telephone booth stood shrouded in the fog.
“That’s a good idea,” said Joel. “You go report.” He smiled pleasantly.
When Antonio Georgio turned toward the phone booth, Joel stuck a snub-nosed .38 in his ribs and fired once. Once was all it took. The sound was muffled by the fog thick night and the closeness of their bodies. Georgio keeled over to the wooden planks of the pier, looking up at Joel in flabbergasted amazement. Within seconds, his eyes rolled shut.
Joel pocketed his .38 and looked toward the gate through which Kristin had passed into the amusement park. Ironman really was waiting inside to meet her. Joel had contacted him earlier and told him all about the supposed trap. Well, Joel thought cynically, grinning crookedly, that’s what you wanted doll—to meet Ironman. And that’s what you’re going to get.
Suddenly a staccato shot shattered the night, and Joel jerked spastically with the shocking physical impact. Another shot rang out. Joel pivoted and collapsed down on top of Antonio Georgio, his eyes staring in horror at the gun in the man’s bloody hand. Then all life went out of Joel’s eyes.
Georgio, for an instant, tried to crawl toward the phone booth off in the distance. It was hopeless. He had used every ounce of his energy just to remain alive this long. And now his energy—and that divine spark—were gone. The gun fell out of his lifeless hand as he collapsed facedown on the wooden pier.
When Hunter arrived at the pier, the first thing he did was go to the pylons to check in with his reconnaissance agent, Georgio. When he found the two lifeless bodies, side by side, he did not have to wonder what had happened. It was all too clear.
He glanced at the phone booth several yards down the pier. Then he glanced at the battered gateway to the amusement park. He knew he should call for reinforcements. The most basic rule of field work was that you covered yourself with superior firepower. There wasn’t time for that now though. It might already be too late. He hurried through the gates in a low crouch, his pistol in his hand.
He moved off to the side instantly, avoiding the single main street. There was a merry-go-round on his left. He circled around behind it, keeping his ears perked and his eyes alert. He hadn’t gone 20 yards into the park when he saw them outside an almost totally destroyed house of mirrors. Kristin was struggling against two of Ironman’s hoods who held her. Ironman was standing before her, his granite face looking merciless.
Where’s Riggio? Hunter wondered, remembering that Georgio’s last phone report said that Ironman had arrived with Riggio and the two hoods. He did not have long to wonder. A smashing blow from a pistol barrel caught him on the side of his head, causing brilliantly colored fireworks to explode inside his skull. He went careening into a whirlpool of blackness.
Twice he regained semiconsciousness, but he couldn’t tell if he were really semiconscious, or just feverishly dreaming. The first time, he felt wooden planks beneath his head and back, and cold salt sea spray was splashing in on him. He thought he was in the bottom of a rowboat, being transported somewhere. He blacked out.
The second time, he was being carried under the arms and ankles by two men, along the deck of what seemed to be the Daisy. The men were talking. One said, “Look there. Isn’t that a boat through the fog, turning in our direction?”
The other man laughed. “With a golden bow? What kind of a ship has a golden bow? You’re seeing the harbor lights reflecting off the water, diffusing through the fog.” Then they started talking about mirages in the desert and pots of gold at the ends of rainbows.
The third time Hunter came to, he knew that he was awake and not just dreaming, because Kristin’s concerned loving face was gazing down at him, and his vision was crystal clear, not hazy. She was sitting on the edge of the bunk he lay on. He tried to rise up. A burst of pain exploded in his head, making him wince sharply and almost swoon back into blackness.
“Careful,” she said. “They hit you really hard.”
He rose up more slowly this time, until he was sitting up in the bunk, his legs over the side. A wet cloth was on his temple, where the sharpest pain seemed to be focused. He felt the throbbing pulse of the Daisy's engines running beneath the floorboards. He knew the ship was steaming out to sea. To make sure, he slowly got up and went to the porthole. He opened it. The ship was moving swiftly. He took in a breath of salt sea air, refreshing himself.
As he looked out the porthole, the ship began to slow. He saw something
shoot down from one of the upper decks into the water. In the moonlight he could not tell for sure what it was, but it appeared to be a hunk of meat from the ship’s galley. The ship continued moving very slowly. Then, after a moment, it picked up speed again.
“What’s happening out there?” Kristin asked.
Hunter had a good idea, but he did not tell her. It was too gruesome. And besides, no purpose would be served by letting her know that the crew was deliberately attracting sharks, so that when it came time to throw the two of them overboard, there would be no remains to be discovered. “It’s nothing,” Hunter said, turning to her. He shut the porthole.
Kristin was clearly desperate about their predicament. “Do you think we should scream out of the porthole? Maybe there are still gamblers aboard the ship, and they’ll hear us?”
Hunter shook his head. “It’s too late. The last gamblers left hours ago, before we were even taken aboard.”
“Well, what’ll we do?” she asked.
He looked at her for a moment, not saying anything. His face was stern. His eyes, though, were gentle. “I want you to understand our situation,” he said. “None of my men know we’re aboard this vessel. We’re steaming out to the high seas; so there’s no chance of the Coast Guard saving us, even if they knew we were aboard, which I’m sure they don’t. We have no weapons. And Ironman has his entire crew aboard, armed, as usual.”
She waited for him to draw a conclusion from all this, to tell her what it all meant, and then what his plan might be to counter it all. But he said nothing more, not about a plan or anything else. He just came to her and took her hands and held them. He looked into her eyes while holding her hands tightly in his, and he let the look in his eyes tell her everything there was to know.
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