Flashfire p-19

by Richard Stark

  ‘Why, Sergeant,’ she said, smiling, coming boldly forward, ‘what brings you here?’ Then, affecting sudden concern to hide her nervousness, she said, ‘Has something happened? Is Daniel all right?’

  ‘Something happened, okay,’ he said, and gestured at the client chair beside her desk. ‘Okay if we sit for a minute?’

  ‘Of course. Do.’

  She was aware of the other reps throwing little surreptitious glances in this direction, but they were the least of her worries. She’d intended to bring Daniel his new clothes after writing up this afternoon’s wasted work, but did she dare, with Sergeant Farley around?

  They sat turned toward one another, and he said, ‘To come right out with it, Parmitt’s gone.’

  She acted as though she didn’t understand. ‘Gone? You don’t mean no. I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘He left the hospital last night,’ Farley said.

  ‘But how could he? He’s so weak.’

  ‘We figure,’ Farley said, ‘somebody gave him some help. I was wondering, would that be you?’

  ‘Me?’ Don’t overplay this, she told herself. ‘He never askedme,’ she said, then frowned at the papers on her desk as she said, ‘I don’t even think I would. He shouldn’t be out of the hospital, he’s too sick.’ Then she looked at Farley again, saw him coolly watching her, and said, ‘He shouldn’t beanywhere else. Are you looking for him?’

  ‘Checked all the motels round about,’ he told her. ‘Talked to the cabbies, checked the bus terminal. Got no cars stolen. You’re right, Parmitt didn’t go out of there on his own, he had help.’

  ‘Well, it wasn’t me,’ she said. ‘Last night, was it?’

  ‘Sometime before one. Between eight and one, we figure.’

  ‘I was home,’ she said, ‘with my mother and my sister, watching TV. I don’t know if your own family is considered a good alibi, but that’s where I was.’

  ‘Okay,’ he said, then seemed to think things over for a minute. ‘The point is,’ he said, ‘anybody around Parmitt is likely to be in trouble.’

  ‘For helping him, you mean.’

  ‘No, a different kind of trouble. We caught a fella in the hospital last night, came there to kill our Mr Parmitt.’

  That did astonish her. ‘My God! No!’

  ‘Yes. Might of slipped in and out, nobody the wiser, except we were already on the scene, account of Parmitt being gone. So now we got this fella, and pretty soon he’ll tell us who hired him, and then we’ll learn a lot more about Daniel Parmitt than we know right now.’

  ‘Good,’ she said.

  ‘But the thing is,’ Farley told her, ‘this is the second try at him we know about, the first being the gunshot put him in the hospital. Before we catch up with the fella that’s paying for all this, some other goon might catch up with Parmitt. And probably anybody standing too close to him.’

  ‘Thank you, Sergeant,’ she said. ‘I understand what you’re saying. Just in case I aminvolved with Daniel, I should know to watch out. But I’m not.’ The laugh she offered was almost completely real. ‘Speeding tickets is as big a criminal as I’ve ever been.’

  ‘Good, keep it that way,’ he said, and got to his feet, at last. She also rose, as he said, ‘If you hear from him, I’d appreciate a call.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ she said. ‘And if youfind out anything about him, would you let me know?’

  ‘Will do.’ He extended a hand. ‘Nice to meet you, Ms Mackenzie.’

  He’s got a thing for me, she thought, as they shook hands, but he’d never show it in a million years. She said, ‘I guess I can cross Daniel Parmitt off my list of eligible bachelors.’

  His grin was just a little sour. ‘Good idea,’ he said.

  She had Daniel stashed in the condo where he’d first told her about the three men who planned to rob tonight’s jewelry auction. That condo had now been sold, by her, but the closing hadn’t happened yet, so nobody would have any reason to go in there for a couple of weeks. She’d brought him in last night, with the help of Loretta, who was suddenly happy and perky and full of good cheer now that the scary part was over, and they’d left him with milk and candy bars and two blankets.

  Now, once she was sure Farley wasn’t still around and following her, she drove back down to the condo, carried the canvas bag in with her, and found Parker seated on the bench on the terrace, where they’d talked the first time. He had one of the blankets wrapped around himself.

  ‘I have clothes for you,’ she said, and showed him the canvas bag.

  He got up stiffly, but he could move better today than last night. He took the bag from her and went off to another room, and when he came back, dressed, he looked almost his normal self, but more gaunt, and still moving slowly. ‘I could use a razor,’ he said as he sat on the terrace bench again. His voice at last was above a whisper, was now a hoarse burr, like a palm brushing corduroy.

  She sat beside him, saying, ‘Okay. Anything else?’

  ‘Can you pick me up at seven-thirty?’

  ‘Daniel, you still want to go after those people? Tonight?’

  ‘Tonight’s when they’re doing it.’

  ‘But you’re I don’t suppose I could argue you out of it.’

  ‘If you argue me out of it,’ he said, ‘you don’t get anything.’

  ‘If they kill you I don’t get anything either.’

  ‘Maybe it won’t happen.’

  ‘Maybe,’ she said, giving up. ‘Sergeant Farley came to see me this afternoon.’

  He watched her. ‘Did he worry you?’

  ‘A little,’ she admitted. ‘But he had more news.’

  ‘What?’

  She told him about the hired killer Farley had captured. He grunted at that and said, ‘That’s the end of it, then.’

  ‘But who is he? Who’s after you like this?’

  ‘The stupid thing is,’ he said, ‘I don’t know. The guy’s making trouble, and he doesn’t have to.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘I got some identification from a guy,’ he said.

  ‘Daniel Parmitt’s identification?’

  He shrugged. ‘He’s a guy who does that kind of thing. He did it for somebody else, South American or Central American I think, maybe a drug guy or a general, whoever. Turns out that guy wants to erase anybody knows about his changeover. He sent people to kill the guy did the work for him. I was there, he thinks I know his story, too, he’s tracking me down. Only now the law’s gonna follow the string back from the guy they just nabbed, and they’re gonna find him, and his cover’s blown. He must be wanted badly somewhere, and it’ll come out. You’ll read about it in the papers, a month or two from now, some guy everybody’s after, he suddenly pops up.’

  ‘But you’re not concerned about him,’ she said. ‘He tries to kill you, and it doesn’t matter to you. These other people, you feel they cheated you, that’s all, but you won’t give up.’

  ‘The other guy’s gonna self-destruct,’ he told her. ‘He has to, he’s too stupid to last. He’s somebody used to power, not brains. But these three are mechanics, we had an understanding, they broke it. They don’t do that.’ He shrugged. ‘It makes sense, or it doesn’t.’

  Did anything about Daniel Parmitt make sense? Getting to her feet, she said, ‘I’ll see you at seven-thirty. With the razor.’

  13

  At seven, the big doors were opened onto the driveway to Mrs Fritz’s house, and the police car drove in to park just off the gravel, facing out. The private security people set up their lectern on the left side of the entrance and stood around waiting, but no one was going to be unfashionably on time, and the first guests didn’t arrive till seven-twelve.

  Each car stopped at the lectern, where the driver handed over to the guard the invitation the guest had received last night after making his sealed bid on one of the items up for auction. The guard checked the invitation against the list on his lectern, then politely nodded the guest through. At the main entrance, s
taff opened the car doors, the partygoers emerged, the driver was given a claim check, and the car was driven by a valet around to the parking area at the side.

  Just over half a mile to the south, Melander and Carlson and Ross had started to dress. Stacked on the dining room table and on the floor were their fire boots, their rubberized gloves, red fire helmets, and black turnout coats with the reflective horizontal yellow stripes and, in block yellow letters on the back, PBFD. Leaning against a wall were their three black air canisters, also with PBFD on them in block white letters. When completely dressed, their visored eyeguards and the mouthpieces from their air canisters would cover their faces entirely.

  ‘I love a costume party,’ Ross said.

  A few miles farther south, Lesley stood in the bathroom doorway and watched Daniel shave off that ridiculous little mustache. It changed him. Without the mustache, he was a hard man, very cold. She realized with surprise that, if she’d seen him this way at first, she wouldn’t have dared approach him.

  He was still battered, though, and she didn’t see how he could hope to beat those three men. He’d stripped to the waist to shave, and his torso was still swathed in bandages, partly because of the bullet holes front and back but mostly because of the broken ribs. Why wouldn’t they just ride right over him?

  And what happens to me? she wondered.

  Mrs Fritz’s ballroom quickly filled. All the men wore essentially what they’d worn at the Breakers last night, and all the women wore something strikingly different. Staff moved among them with canapes and champagne, and special lights gleamed on the display tables where the jewelry was arrayed. Maroon velvet ropes kept the guests from getting within reaching distance of the jewelry. Everybody was here now except the musicians, who would arrive later, and play for dancing after the auction was complete. To one side, Mrs Fritz and the auctioneer, a professional man who’d worked any number of charity balls around here over the years, consulted together about timing.

  ‘I think it’s time,’ Melander said, and the three of them, encumbered in their full firefighter gear, tromped out of the house and around to the fire engine parked at the side. Carlson climbed up behind the wheel while Melander and Ross took up standing positions on the outside of the fire engine, just to increase the visual plausibility of the thing.

  Carlson said, ‘Ready?’ and the other two agreed they were ready. Carlson picked up the two small radio transmitters from the seat beside him and pressed down on the buttons.

  In the ballroom, the incendiary rockets came thundering out of the amplifiers still in the corner. Some of the rockets flew straight up, to embed themselves in the ceiling and spray sparks and flame onto the people below. Some shot directly back into the wall, gouting flame and smoke, and the rest drilled down into the floor. None were aimed at the guests or the display tables of jewelry.

  Shocking heat and noise and smoke abruptly filled the room. No one knew what had happened, where this sudden disaster had come from. A lot of people thought rockets were being fired from outside the house. Everybody milled around in sudden fear, trying to find a way out. The display tables and the auctioneer’s stand blocked the terrace doors, so the only way out was through the broad interior doorway into the rest of the house. People jammed together, making a bottleneck in the doorway, clawing to get through.

  Outside, the police and the security guards stared in amazement at the sudden fire burning on the roof, listened unbelievingly to the screams from inside the house, gaped at each other in bewilderment, not knowing what they were supposed to do. Then, almost immediately it seemed, they felt the great relief of hearing that approaching siren.

  The fire engine came rushing up from the south, red lights flashing, siren yowling. Police and guards cleared everybody out of the entranceway, and the fire engine went tearing around the curve, Melander and Ross clinging to the handholds, the fire engine rushing full tilt at the house, where the first of the fleeing guests were just now beginning to stagger out into the clear night air.

  Carlson didn’t hit the brake until the very last second, the big fire engine spewing gravel as it shuddered to a stop. He switched off the motor and took the key with him, to cause a little extra trouble down the line, but left the siren on, screaming away, so communication among the other people present would be just that much more difficult.

  Lesley helped Daniel into his shirt, and the two of them gathered up everything that had been brought into the condo. She said, ‘Are you sure, Daniel?’

  ‘Time to go,’ he said.

  The three firemen ran heavy-footed through the house, pushing the panicked guests out of their way, finally helping the last of the guests and staff out of the ballroom. They slammed the double doors and slid a massive sideboard over the polished floor and up against the doors to block them.

  Alice Prester Young staggered out of the house alone, into the glare and scream of the big fire engine, with more fire engines coming now from far away, racing south. She’d lost Jack somewhere, she’d been terrified, she had to struggle through the awful crowd completely on her own.

  Where was Jack? Was he hurt, crushed by the people back there? Where was Jack?

  She stared around at the people collapsing on the lawn, and all at once she saw Jack, and he was carrying somebody, in his arms, like a groom carrying a bride. He was reeling like a drunken man, but he was carrying a woman, and as he at last put her on her feet on the lawn Alice saw she was young Kim Metcalf, Howard Metcalf’s sexpot stewardess wife. And as she saw them, Jack saw her and stopped dead.

  The stupid thing is, she hadn’t thought anything until Jack stopped like that, like

  like a caught burglar. And Kim’s look of shock and guilt when she met Alice’s eyes across the reeling, weeping, stunned crowd, there was that, too.

  Movement to her left. Alice turned her suddenly heavy head, and Howard Metcalf stood there, near her on the steps, gazing out and down at his wife. With great difficulty, Alice turned her heavy head again and looked at Jack, and now he seemed to have no expression on his face at all, like a bad drawing, or a minor figure in the background of a comic strip.

  In all that racket, there was a great silence, enclosing the four of them.

  In the ballroom, Melander and Carlson and Ross quickly shimmied out of their gloves, helmets, air tanks, fire boots, and turnout coats. Beneath, they each wore a black wet suit and a large zippered bag on a belt around the waist. The bags now held nothing but divers’ face masks and headlamps, which they removed so they could load the bags with all of Miriam Hope Clendon’s jewelry.

  Lesley and Daniel drove northward in her Lexus, neither saying anything, he resting his head back, eyes closed. Conserving himself. Then he opened his eyes and looked out ahead and said, ‘Slow down.’

  She did, but said, ‘Why?’

  Instead of answering, he opened his window. She had the air-conditioning on, of course, and now the humid air billowed in, and with it a faint distant sound of sirens. She said, ‘Police?’

  He laughed, a sound like a bark. ‘Fire engine,’ he said. ‘I told you they were gaudy. They aren’t going in from the sea after all, they’re going in from the land, in a fire engine.’

  ‘But there isn’t any fire,’ she said.

  ‘With them? There’s a fire. It’s along here now.’

  He meant Mr Roderick’s house, or whoever Mr Roderick really was. As he closed his window, she said, ‘Do you want me to come in with you?’

  ‘No. You go home. I’ll call you tomorrow.’

  ‘What if you don’t?’

  ‘Then I don’t,’ he said. ‘Stop here.’

  She rolled to a stop near the Roderick house, and he paused, his hand on the door handle. ‘The question is, how do they get back out? Tuxes under the fire coats?’

  She said, ‘To mingle with the guests, you mean? Could they do that?’

  ‘They think they can do anything,’ he said, and opened the door. ‘I’ll call you tomorrow.’

  At the Fritz
house, more fire engines had arrived, blocked by the milling crowd and the still-screaming first fire engine that none of the later firefighters recognized. ‘Whose is this? Is this from West Palm? What the hell’s it doing here?’

  In the ballroom, Melander and Carlson and Ross finished loading the jewelry into their waist bags. They put the air canisters back on, put on the divers’ face masks and the mouthpieces and the headlamps. From hooks inside their turnout coats they brought out pairs of black flippers.

  Lesley found a place to park, locked the Lexus, and walked back down the road toward Mr Roderick’s house.

  Firemen hurried through the mansion and found the ballroom doors wedged shut. They had their axes and used them, splintering the doors.

  Melander and Carlson and Ross heard the thuds of the axes. Melander shoved a display case out of the way and they went through the terrace doors and ran across the terrace, invisible in their black wet suits, holding their flippers in their hands. A little apart from one another, so they wouldn’t collide underwater, they dove into the sea.

  Firemen smashed their way into the ballroom. Police followed. As the rockets fizzled out and the fires began to fade, they looked around at the emptiness.

  All gone.

  FOUR

  1

  If he didn’t exert himself, the pains in his chest were just a small irritation, a low grumbling, like far-off thunder. But when he had to move, even to do simple things like pull on pants, the pain punched him all over again, like brand-new, like the bullet thudding into him right now instead of a week ago. Still, he didn’t mind the pain as much as the weakness, especially in his legs. He wasn’t used to being dialed down like this; he kept expecting the strength, and it wasn’t there.