As he studied what was left of his finger, Nicky was dropped by the next gunshot.
***
After shooting the pistol away, Gage calmly lowered the heavy .44 to Nicky’s right knee. It was an easy shot any amateur could have made. But Gage Hartline was no amateur, and he nailed the frozen mobster square in the kneecap, satisfied as he watched the man crumple to the ground after fragments of lead and bone ripped through the back of his leg. Bruno had loaded his pistol with hollow-points: nasty bullets designed to rip and tear as they passed through flesh and bone. Nicky’s fingers and knee stood no chance against the supersonic projectiles from the magnum. The Frenchman screamed louder than any person Gage had ever heard as he collapsed to the floor.
While allowing Nicky to process what had just happened, Gage held the pistol steadily on him and stood, wincing from the searing pain in his side. He checked the empty hallway as he crossed the room to stare at the writhing criminal.
Nicky had his chin pressed down against his bare chest, drooling. His eyes rotated between his roughly amputated finger and his nearly severed leg, finally looking up to see the man who had defeated him. The knee was blown almost in two, the lower leg held on by sinewy tendons and a strand of ragged skin on each side of the bullet’s carnage. Nicky’s breathing was labored as he surveyed the damage, but when he turned to Gage, his eyes were defiant, burning rage and fury.
“Baise toi!”
“Sorry, I don’t understand much French,” Gage answered in English.
Nicky’s mouth opened, his tongue moving up and down as if he needed moisture but wasn’t able to provide it for himself. Finally he spoke in heavily accented English. “You will be hunted down and killed for this, you fucking inbreed. My men will rip your balls off, one by one, and feed them to you.”
Gage didn’t really feel like talking because, what was the point? Judge and jury, he raised the pistol, aiming it at Nicky’s face and said these words: “You killed the only person I have ever truly loved, and you had no reason to do so. None at all. You could have killed me, fine. But she was good and pure and you ripped that from her…and me.” He collected himself before continuing, the sides of his mouth curling upward. “And before I killed Luc and Bruno…they gave you up, told me everything, and you know what?” Gage’s mouth broke into a full Jack-Nicholson-in-The-Shining maniacal smile. “I didn’t even have to work very hard, Nicky. They were more than happy to rat you out, ready to see you die, you slime.”
Nicky listened to this with a stunned expression. Just as Gage finished, his eyes cut to his right. Something caught his eye.
As he was about to turn, Gage felt the icy hardness of a pistol pointed just above his left ear. He instantly knew that the sound from the television had provided someone, probably the man in the blue suit, plenty of ambient cover-noise to sneak up behind him. Colonel Hunter had drilled into Gage’s head, many times, that if you let a situation get personal, then you let a situation get reckless.
Gage had indeed let it get personal. He had messed up.
***
Nicky could not believe his luck. Marcel held the pistol tightly against the dead man standing’s head. Nicky glanced at his finger and at his shattered knee. He was certain he would lose the leg, limping around for the remainder of his days on a prosthetic like some circus sideshow. Well, because of it, he intended to make this American suffer unlike anyone ever had. He’d read books on torture, enjoying it like others might read a manual on gardening. He pulled himself, with considerable pain, back against the wall and propped himself on his elbows. Before he spoke, he grasped at his groin, soothing himself that he still had his biroute, the most important piece of his body.
“Don’t kill him, Marcel. Not yet,” Nicky grunted as he propped himself higher. “I’ve got something very special for this American coward.”
Marcel’s eyes were boring into Gage’s head, only glancing at Nicky momentarily.
“Get his gun,” Nicky muttered through his pain. “Get it and then shoot both of his fucking knees, just as he has done to me.” He coughed as he struggled for breath. “We’ll get a torch from the tool shed and cauterize his every wound, just to keep him alive while we experiment on him.”
Marcel held the pistol on Gage. Gage kept a steady aim on Nicky. The only man in the room who wasn’t calm and cool was Nicky.
“Get the pistol, Marcel.”
No one moved.
“Move your fucking ass, Marcel, and get that gun!”
In English, Marcel answered him. “No, I’m not going to do that.”
Nicky’s eyes widened.
***
Gage heard Marcel deny Nicky’s request. What the hell is going on? He knew if he were to go ahead and pull his own trigger, he could kill Nicky but would die a second later from Marcel’s bullet. After all the self-encouragement about not being afraid to die, suddenly, Gage wanted to live more than anything he had ever desired in his life. A world without Monika seemed a murky, melancholy place, but it’s all he had known for such a short time. His mind had been so bent by Crete, and then revenge, that maybe, once this was over, he might have a chance to be content with himself again.
With a gentle nudge from his pistol, Marcel spoke to him. “Monsieur Hartline, do—not—move. If you do, I will shoot you. Do you understand?”
“Kill him!” Nicky screamed in French, utterly indignant, spittle exploding from his mouth.
Marcel nudged a little harder. “Hartline, do you understand?”
Gage nodded.
Marcel removed the pistol from Gage’s head and slowly turned it to Nicky. The two men who had spent so many years together—traveling, eating, working—locked eyes. There was a moment of sharing, and any observer would have seen the unrestrained hatred in Marcel’s expression. Nicky began to spew curses; Marcel raised the pistol, aiming it at his head.
“Wait,” Gage said, touching Marcel’s arm and lowering it. Marcel turned to him with narrowed eyes.
Gage licked his lips, keeping his pistol on Nicky. “Not that way.” For a moment Gage turned, sharing a look with Marcel. “This man…this…this…animal is responsible for Monika Brink’s death, and I couldn’t even begin to imagine how many others.” He turned back to Nicky, his voice icy. “Quick death is far too decent for him.”
Marcel stared at Gage a moment before he nodded. Nicky began to yell and scream with more force and intensity, his English and French unintelligible as they melded together in a torrent of absurd invectives.
Gage retrieved Nicky’s Steyr pistol. It had taken the .44 slug just over the trigger and was now useless. But just in case, he tucked it into his waistband before using the remote to power off the television. Nicky had screamed himself out, and a blissful silence settled into the bedroom.
Marcel turned to Gage, his brows lowering. “What are you doing?”
“You’ll see.”
Displaying total trust, Gage handed the Auto Mag to Marcel, who held it on Nicky, old west style, a pistol in each hand. Next, Gage moved to Nicky, jerking him from the floor and ignoring the pained shrieks. What remained of Nicky’s lower leg dragged behind him, twisting as Gage pulled him back to the bathroom, hefting him into the empty whirlpool bath, dropping him there with a thud. Bright red blood contrasted against the gleaming white of the bathtub.
“Can you stay here with him?” Gage asked.
Marcel seemed highly puzzled, but nodded.
“And where could I find a large bucket, and a shovel?”
“Why?” Marcel asked without contempt.
“Trust me on this.”
Marcel explained how to get to the basement.
As Gage limped down the stairs, he could hear Nicky’s curses, berating Marcel—and his entire family—with every insult he knew. Gage found the shovel and the large painter’s bucket, hobbling outside and chiding himself for not yet doing something to stem his own bleeding. But, the mission came first, and he had promised himself that he would avenge Monika properly.
A minute later, Gage reemerged in the bathroom. Nicky was now quite pallid, with probably a half-hour to live, at the most, before he died from shock and a lack of blood.
Marcel peered at the dark contents of the bucket, his face darkening. “What on earth do you have in there?”
“You’ll see.” Gage turned to Nicky with a calm face.
“There’s no point in a long speech. I think you’re a beast, Mister Arnaud. You have no respect for life and you’re nothing more than a black mark on this earth. You will die tonight, but for my own peace of mind, I want it to be slowly, and with great pain.” Gage took the Auto Mag from Marcel and blew Nicky’s other knee in two, making Marcel jump as he had not been prepared for the roar of the large caliber weapon in the enclosed space.
Nicky shrieked in pain and again erupted in a torrent of curses. Marcel put fingers in his ears, wiggling them.
Gage took the bucket and held it over Nicky’s body. “So Monsieur Arnaud…an animal deserves to die like one.” He dumped the contents of the ant colony on Nicky, watching with fascination as thousands of European red ants scrabbled angrily over his bloody body. Nicky’s indignation was replaced with primal fear and pain as the ants began stinging his flesh with minute quantities of formic acid, many of them gathering at the veritable feast of his bloody leg stumps.
And as Gage had hoped he might, Nicky Arnaud pissed himself.
Gage turned to Marcel, painfully sweeping his arm to the exit. “Shall we leave him to it?”
Marcel’s eyes were perfectly round. He watched as Nicky writhed in the tub like a fish out of water, his screams coming in chirps as the irritated ants stung him one by one.
Just before he followed Gage, Marcel spit on Nicky and pulled the door shut.
***
The water was icy cool and heaven-sent. The kitchen in Nicky Arnaud’s mansion was cavernous with its twin hidden refrigerators, a massive island with a gas stove, and two deep-well sinks on opposite sides of the cooking areas. It was a kitchen fit for France’s finest chef and, through the fog of pain, Gage guessed Nicky Arnaud probably had never cooked anything of merit in his entire life. The screams from upstairs were dying down, and now the only sound Gage could hear was Marcel rummaging in the cabinets. He took another sip of the water and watched as the Frenchman approached with a first aid kit.
Minutes earlier, after dumping the ants, the adrenaline had ceased to flow and each step confirmed for Gage that his ribs were indeed broken. It was such that he was unable to take a deep breath without white hot pain from the shattered bones.
“We must get the tape very tight,” Marcel said, sounding like a man of experience. A cigarette dangling from his lips, he pulled on a rubber glove and gently probed Gage’s wound like a field surgeon. He flipped on another light to give himself a better view, leaning in very close and examining the injury. “It appears to have passed through you cleanly. Other than the rib, do you feel any other pain?”
Gage shook his head, in a form of mild shock over the entire situation. “Just my knee, but that came from diving over your wall outside.”
“This will likely hurt a bit.” Marcel liberally coated a piece of gauze in antiseptic and began swabbing the wound with his gloved hand. As he worked, he tilted his head upward. He spoke passable English, heavily accented. “I’m sure you must wonder why I did what I did.”
Gage winced as the gauze penetrated his wound. “I imagine you’ve been looking for the right opportunity.”
Marcel nodded. “Nicholas was once a strong soldier, years ago, but deteriorated rapidly. It had gotten to where his hunger for power had made him forget what his job was.” Marcel stood and retrieved a kitchen towel. “Les Glaives du Peuple was formed after the final German occupation of France, during reconstruction. It was initially developed to provide support for the worker’s organizations that were being taken advantage of by the government and ruthless private business.”
“A union organization that got out of control,” Gage said.
“You’re obviously thinking of La Cosa Nostra, and the American mafia.” He knelt again, swabbing the wound, absorbing excess antiseptic and oozing blood. “And yes, there are some similarities. But Les Glaives was a more businesslike operation, with far more credibility than you would expect. Was. The Unione Corse operates in southern and western France, mainly, and we handle the north and east. But somewhere in the seventies, we lost our way. Greed supplanted good, and ruthlessness ruled the day. Men like Nicky Arnaud became the norm.”
Gage squinted his eyes at Marcel. “But why wait so long, and let him kill so many others?”
Marcel raised his eyebrows. “Maybe you were the, I believe the word is ‘catalyst’, that I needed. And today was simply not a good day.”
“The dog.”
“You saw?”
Gage nodded.
“Fitting that an old crook like me would allow human death for years, but allow a dog to be the tipping point.” He smiled contritely. “It was time, Monsieur Hartline. Nicholas Arnaud needed to be dealt with.”
Gage tried to take a deep breath, unable to do so. Marcel finished what he was doing and, rather than use the medical tape, they used the remainder of Gage’s duct tape, with Marcel tightly winding it four times around his body, pressing the gauze tightly against the wound. Gage stood and walked around the kitchen. It was much better.
“Thank you.”
Marcel shrugged. “I truly am sorry about what happened to your lady.”
Gage nodded with his head bowed before his eyes came up. “Won’t the police connect what I did in Metz with what happened here?”
“The police will never know what happened here.”
“But they may determine that what I did to Luc and Bruno is related to what happened at Michel Brink’s book store, and Monika’s death in Frankfurt.”
Marcel shrugged again. “Probably, but it may take a few days. Luc and Bruno were not well known, and the only thing that might tie them to Nicholas would be their car. By then there will be no evidence at all here.” Marcel chain-lit another cigarette and offered one to Gage, who refused. “And, as you might imagine, we have many friends in the police organizations.” He smiled. “I do not expect much in the way of an investigation.”
Gage put the pistol onto the granite countertop, somewhat of a gesture. “The car you mentioned, I have it.”
“The Opel?”
Gage nodded.
“Excellent. Keep it. It’s registered to a holding company we own—unless I report it as stolen, no one will ever know. The papers should be in the glove box. There should be no problems, and if you are stopped, they will simply call here.”
Gage delicately slipped the sweatshirt over his head with some help. “Marcel, what will happen here, really? Certainly men who work with you will come after me, or the police.”
Marcel lifted the Auto Mag by the barrel, handing it to him. “As I mentioned, we have relationships that run quite deep, Monsieur Hartline. As far as anyone will be concerned, Nicholas has gone away, fleeing for many crimes I’m sure none of us will ever know about. Everything else will disappear, just as the unfortunate incident with the book dealer in Metz.”
Gage accepted the pistol before shaking Marcel’s hand. Neither man smiled, but there was a respect between them as their eyes locked. “Oh,” Marcel said, remembering something. “Wait here.” He reappeared moments later holding a paper sack wrapped around something large and rectangular. “Luc and Bruno took this when…” Marcel’s voice trailed off as his eyes went to the floor.
Gage accepted it. “Thank you.”
“I specifically ordered them not to harm her.”
“I believe you,” Gage answered, dropping the bag into his pack. He was ready to leave France. He looked at his pack and back at Marcel. “Did you read the diary?”
“I did.”
“And do you know who wrote it?”<
br />
“I believe I do.”
“Would you mind keeping it to yourself?”
Marcel was silent for a moment before his mouth creased into a smile. “I hate history, Herr Hartline. It was among my worst subjects in school.”
Gage laughed, immediately clamping a hand to his side.
The two men became silent again, lifting their eyes to the ceiling. For a full minute they waited—there were no more sounds from upstairs. Marcel pointed his finger to Gage’s pistol. “Might I borrow that for a moment?” Gage handed it to him.
Marcel ejected the cartridge and the round from the chamber. He used a sharp knife to gently scoop out even more of a bullet’s tip, making a dull, blunt hole in the projectile that would hit someone like a Mack Truck at close range. Pressing the bullet into the top of the cartridge, Marcel cocked it and told Gage he would be right back.
Gage waited twenty seconds before he heard the thunderous boom. Marcel reappeared and handed Gage the warm pistol. “Nicky Arnaud has been beheaded,” he said flatly. Eyeing Gage he said, “This is France, after all.”
Gage nodded but said nothing.
After Marcel removed the lasers from the fence, he drove Gage up the hill to his car. Gage was unlocking the Opel when Marcel spoke.
“There’s one more thing.”
Gage tossed his bag into the trunk and turned. “Yes?”
“A man, a Frenchman, Jean Jenois: do you know him?
Gage straightened. “I do.”
“Watch out for him, Monsieur Hartline.”
“He wants the diaries, doesn’t he?” Gage asked.
“Yes, and he will kill you for them.”
“And you?”
Marcel pitched his cigarette onto the sidewalk. “I am finished with you, sir.” He crossed his hands over one another, a cufflink catching a glint of the streetlamp. “And you with me, I hope?”
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