He looked around for the gun and couldn’t see it. He realised she must be lying on it. He levered his foot under her arm and with a grunt he forced her over. As her head lifted from the floor her left eye plopped out of its socket and hung grotesquely on her cheek, gelatinous fluid dripping from it. Her hair was matted with brain tissue and blood and as he flipped her onto her back it spread out in a pool around her head like a scarlet halo. The gun was by his feet, its safety off.
She’d closed the door when she’d come down into the basement and she’d made very little noise as she died, so Joker reckoned no-one upstairs would have heard. He used the tip of his right foot to slide the gun so that it was between his feet, careful not to touch the trigger. He was finding it difficult to focus, and sweat was pouring off his forehead and dripping into his eyes. He shuffled his feet together and manoeuvred the firearm so that its butt was angled up, its barrel away from him. It was going to hurt, he knew, and he tried to prepare himself. He doubted that he’d have the energy for more than one attempt, and he prayed that he wouldn’t pass out. He took a deep breath, then brought both feet off the ground, swinging them up and taking all his weight on his bound wrists. It felt as if his hands were being ripped from his wrists and he screamed before he bit down on his lip. He contracted the aching muscles in his stomach and pushed up with his legs, trying to maintain his momentum. His legs were dead and his abdomen felt as if it was going to collapse. He screamed, partly in agony and partly out of frustration. He tried to blank out the pain and imagined that he was back in basic training, hanging from wall bars and doing repetitions of leg-lifts, building strength and stamina. He grunted and sweated and held on to the image, remembering the old sergeant-major who’d cursed out any of the recruits who couldn’t manage at least fifty of the torturous leg-lifts. He screamed again and realised that his knee was banging against his chin. He opened his eyes and saw his legs were up, the gun almost slipping from between his feet. Two more inches and it would be in his hands. He held his fingers wide like a child trying to catch a ball and brought his knees closer to his face, the pain in his wrists like red-hot manacles searing down to the bone. He felt something warm and hard against his fingers and he grabbed the butt of the pistol — just in time because his legs fell back to the floor, his stomach and leg muscles cramped and strained.
He stood up on tiptoe to relieve the strain on his wrists. His body was bathed in sweat and all his wounds were open and streaming blood. He shook his head, trying to clear his vision. Under normal circumstances he was a crack shot with a pistol, but his present predicament was far from normal. He could barely focus on the chain where it wrapped around the pipe, and the sights on the gun kept splitting apart as his vision blurred. He blinked and screwed up his eyes, bringing the sights into line with the chain. He took a breath, let half of it out, and squeezed the trigger, twice. The shots echoed around the basement, the sound deafening him. The chain was still in one piece. There were two metallic streaks on the pipe, the closest to the chain was some three inches away. It might as well have been a mile. He concentrated and fired again, two shots. The second bullet slammed into the chain, breaking one of the links before ricocheting into a wall, and Joker felt the chain unravel from around the pipe, dropping all his weight onto his legs. They couldn’t take the strain and they buckled underneath him, leaving him sprawled across the woman’s body.
His hands were still chained together, the broken link had been on the section passed around the pipe. He didn’t have time to try to free his wrists because Hennessy and Bailey and whoever else was upstairs would have been certain to have heard the shots, despite the sound-proofing. He could see two light switches, one at the top of the stairs and one close to the bottom. He felt himself begin to lose consciousness and he fought against it, shaking his head in an attempt to clear it. He staggered over to the lower light switch and flicked it off, plunging the basement into darkness.
Cole Howard made notes in his tiny, cramped handwriting, filling in the gaps on the photocopied report sheet. The caller was a housewife who had been buying a set of saucepans at a Glen Burnie shopping mall when she’d seen a woman she thought might be the one in the photograph. She’d bought a large pepper mill and the caller remembered that her hair looked as if it had been dyed blonde. She’d used a credit card because the woman recalled having to wait while it was swiped and approved.
Howard thanked her and hung up. He doubted that Mary Hennessy would be out shopping for pepper mills prior to an assassination, but every call had to be verified. It wouldn’t be difficult — an agent would be assigned to visit the store to find out if the salesperson could identify Hennessy’s picture and obtain details of the blonde’s credit card. It was a simple enough call to check, but it would take several hours. And within the space of ten minutes following the telephone number flashing onto the television screen there had been at least eighty calls and still all the lights were flashing on Helen’s console. The workload was building quickly, and Howard wondered how many men Mulholland would be willing to assign to the case. So far his commitment had been open-ended, but the calls were racking up at a frightening rate.
Don Clutesi had his own receiver pressed to his ear and was frantically taking notes, nodding his head animatedly. He kept saying “yes, yes, yes” as he scribbled. Howard couldn’t hear what else he was whispering into the phone but he was clearly excited about something. He wasn’t just filling out the report form, he was taking additional notes and Howard peered over, trying to read them upside down. Clutesi saw him and he wrote in large capital letters at the top of his notepad — “Got them!”
Howard frowned. The phone on his desk rang but he ignored it as he scrutinised Clutesi’s notes. Helen looked across at him, realised he was otherwise engaged, and took back the call. Clutesi replaced his receiver. “A woman in Baltimore leased a house overlooking the Chesapeake Bay to a woman answering Hennessy’s description,” he said, clearly elated. “Seven bedrooms and three bathrooms. And the woman used a cheque and ID with the same name that Hennessy used on the credit card she paid for the hotel room with. It’s her, all right.” He punched the air and grinned.
“How long did she take the house for?” asked Howard.
“Six months; she paid three months in advance.”
Clutesi waved Ed Mulholland over and quickly briefed the anti-terrorism chief on what he’d learned. Mulholland beamed. “That sounds like it,” he agreed. “Okay, you and Cole take the chopper out there now. I’ll have a SWAT team from Baltimore secure a perimeter around the house. They should be in place by the time you get there.”
Clutesi scribbled down the address of the house and the phone number and address of the woman who’d made the call. “Her name’s Martha Laing; I told her someone would be in touch,” he said. “It’d help if someone could take her out to the house and liaise with the SWAT team commander — supply him with floor plans and the like, in case we have to storm the place.”
Mulholland nodded and took the piece of paper. “I’ll have it taken care of, Don.” He handed a cellular telephone to Clutesi and another to Howard. “Now you and Cole get to it. The chopper’ll be waiting for you at the pad.”
Carlos had smiled when he heard Cramer scream. He knew Dina Rashid’s ways and that a simple straightforward killing wasn’t her way. She had to have her amusement first. In some respects she was similar to Mary Hennessy, but whereas Dina got some twisted, perverse sexual thrill out of seeing her men squirm, Hennessy seemed to do it simply to be cruel. Carlos couldn’t imagine Mary Hennessy having sex with a man before killing him, whereas that was Dina’s favourite method.
Mary had gone upstairs with Bailey to pack and to warn the two Americans. Carlos had grabbed a kitchen cloth and was quickly working around the kitchen, removing fingerprints as quickly as possible from those surfaces most likely to have been touched. He loaded all the dishes and cutlery into the dishwasher and switched it on, and then headed for the sitting room. As he began to rub
down the television set he heard two shots, and then silence. He nodded to himself as he worked the cloth around the set’s controls. Dina Rashid was a true professional, despite her sexual quirks, and he much preferred working with her than the two Americans. He moved across to the coffee table and ran the cloth over it. There were several magazines on the table and he gathered them up and took them to the kitchen. As he threw them into a black garbage bag he heard two more pistol shots from the basement, and he frowned. Dina would never need more than two shots at close range. He dropped the bag on the floor and rushed over to the door which led to the basement stairs. He stood to the side and eased it open. The basement was in darkness. “Dina?” he called. There was no answer. “Dina?” he repeated. There was only silence. Carlos slammed the door shut with his foot and turned the key in the lock. He pushed the kitchen table over and jammed it up against the door before walking quickly to the hall. He called the others down and quickly explained what had happened.
“Aren’t we going to see if she’s all right?” asked Schoelen. He looked at Hennessy as if fearful that he was going to get the blame for the operation falling apart.
Carlos shook his head. “If she was all right, she’d have answered,” he said. “There were four shots. We can assume she’s dead.” Lovell smiled and Carlos glared at him. “Unless you want to go down, Lovell?” he said, staring menacingly at the sniper. Lovell averted his eyes.
“So what do we do, Ilich?” asked Mary. She knew how close Dina and Carlos were. It would have to be his decision.
“We leave, now,” said Carlos, his voice level. He looked at Schoelen. “You and Lovell go to the motel you stayed at before you moved here. Take both cars and take Mary and Bailey with you, but keep them under cover in the back of the car. I’ll see you there within an hour. Okay?”
“Okay,” agreed Schoelen.
“What will you be doing?” asked Bailey, nervously.
“I’ll get rid of the evidence,” he said. “First put all your things in the cars.” He pulled a pistol from the waistband of his trousers and gave it to Schoelen. “While they’re loading the cars, you stay in the kitchen. If you hear anything, shoot through the door.”
“What about Dina’s stuff?” asked Mary.
“I’ll take care of that,” said Carlos. “Now I suggest we move quickly. I don’t think we have much time.”
As Mary, Bailey and the snipers carried out their bags, Carlos went up to Dina’s room. Her rifle was in its case on top of her wardrobe and he took it down, opening it to check that everything was there. He found a small leather bag containing tools and cleaning equipment in the top drawer of her dressing table and he took that, too. Her pyjamas were hanging on the back of the door and Carlos held the jacket against his face, breathing in her fragrance. He would miss Dina Rashid, but he had no time to grieve for her. Not just then.
He took the case and the bag, along with his own suitcase, and went outside. He put them in the trunk of the car and slammed the lid shut and then went into the garage where he picked up a red can of gasoline. As he walked back to the house, Hennessy and Bailey came out, each carrying a suitcase. Bailey seemed even more apprehensive than usual and he was continually looking at Mary as if asking for approval. Carlos knew that Mary would be able to calm him down once they were away from the house. Behind them, Lovell left the house, carrying his gun case over his shoulder. Lovell got into his red Mustang and drove off first, while Bailey and Hennessy climbed into Schoelen’s rental car. Carlos headed back into the house.
He started upstairs, in Dina’s room, sprinkling gasoline on the bed and across the carpet to the door, leading a trail which went down the stairs, through the sitting room, and into the kitchen. Schoelen was leaning against the sink, the pistol in both hands. He raised one eyebrow as he watched Carlos pour the gasoline over the floor. “Planning a barbecue?” he asked sardonically.
Carlos sloshed gasoline over the kitchen table and against the door leading to the basement. “You’d better get your things and get to the car,” he said.
“Sure thing,” said Schoelen, handing the gun back to Carlos.
“Any sound from our friend?” Carlos asked.
Schoelen shook his head and went upstairs to gather his belongings and rifle. Carlos heard him walk back down the stairs, the car door open and close, and a few seconds later the car start up and crunch down the driveway.
Something inside Carlos refused to let him leave without trying to reach Dina one last time, even though he knew it was futile. He stood by the door and rested his head against the jamb. “Dina!” he called. “Dina, can you hear me?”
There was no answer and Carlos slapped the wood in frustration. “Damn you, Cramer,” he cursed under his breath. “May you burn in hell.”
The air was thick with gasoline fumes and Carlos was beginning to feel a little light-headed. He picked up the cloth he’d used to wipe down the furniture and slopped it around the sodden floor. There was a box of matches by the stove and he carried them out through the back door, keeping the sodden cloth away from his trousers. He struck a match and lit one end of the cloth. It burned fiercely and he tossed it into the kitchen where it made a whooshing sound as the fumes ignited. He turned away and climbed into his car.
Down in the basement, Joker heard a man’s voice shouting for Dina and a few seconds later a car started up and drove off. He listened and heard a crackling sound like paper rustling. The basement was completely dark except for a rectangle of light at the top of the stairs, outlining the door. Joker recalled that at some point he had seen light coming into the room from somewhere behind him, but now there was only blackness. He steadied his breathing and listened. There was only the crackling noise. No voices. No footsteps. He’d heard three cars drive away, so that meant at least three people had left the house, but he didn’t know how many there had been originally. He’d seen Bailey, and Hennessy, and the man with the moustache, and the two Americans who’d hauled him out of the car. That meant at least five, plus the dead girl. There could be two waiting for him upstairs.
His wrists were still chained together so he switched the light back on with his mouth while keeping his gun targeted at the door. When there was no reaction he went over to the workbench where Mary Hennessy had kept her tools and knives. He found a keyring with several keys on it and one of them fitted the padlock which fastened the chain around his wrist. He winced as he unlocked the padlock and unhooked it from the chain. The scab which had formed over the hole in his right breast split open and fresh blood dribbled down his chest. Every movement of his right arm sent bolts of pain deep inside his chest. Joker gritted his teeth and rubbed the circulation back into his battered hands. He found his shorts and jeans and pulled them on, followed by his training shoes. It wasn’t that he was cold, it was more that he didn’t want to fight naked. He winced as he pushed his right foot into his shoe. Hennessy had damn near severed his toe.
He crept over to the far wall, looking for the source of the light he’d seen earlier. There was a shutter high up, and he opened it to find a locked window with three thick bars blocking any exit. There was only one way out of the basement, and that was through the door. He went back to the stairs and tiptoed up, his back close to the wall, the gun at the ready. The higher he got up the steps, the louder the crackling became. Tendrils of smoke drifted up from the bottom of the door and when he put his left hand flat against the wood he could feel the heat burning through. He turned the handle and pushed, but the door was locked.
He went down the stairs and picked up the pieces of his shirt. He soaked them in the bucket and draped them over his head and shoulders, then upturned the bucket and poured the rest of the water over his body. It stung when it ran over his cuts and abrasions but he ignored the pain, knowing that it would be a matter of minutes before the wooden structure began to collapse. He ran back up the steps and fired two shots at the lock. He kicked the door hard and the wood splintered. He kicked it again and it opened, but only a
few inches. Something was blocking it. Thick, cloying smoke billowed in, making him cough. He wrapped one of the pieces of wet cloth over his mouth and kicked harder but the door wouldn’t budge. Through the gap he could see flames flaring up from the floor and a wave of heat singed his eyebrows. He put his shoulder to the warm wood but could make no impact on it. He pulled the door shut and wiped his face with one of the wet cloths. The door was held in place with two hinges, each with six screws. He took a step back down the stairs and fired two shots at the top hinge and it buckled. The lower hinge disintegrated the first time Joker fired at it, his ears ringing with the sounds of the shots. He did a quick tally of the bullets he’d fired. Four at the chain, two at the lock, three at the hinges. Nine shots. The 411 held eleven cartridges in the clip, so that left two shots, assuming the clip had been full originally.
He seized the door handle and pulled it towards him. The wood around the hinges fractured and the door fell towards him, banging him on his head. He dragged it down and it fell against the stairs. The heat leapt at him like a wild animal, pushing him and threatening to steal the breath from his lungs. As the door clattered by his side he saw the table which had been blocking his escape. It was lodged between the door frame and the sink unit. He’d never have moved it by pushing. He clambered over it and leapt through a sheet of flame that sprang from the floor. He could feel the hairs on his arms crisp and burn and he held the wet cloth over his mouth so that he wouldn’t singe his lungs. He narrowed his eyes, looking for a way out. A figure appeared to his left, a man in sweatshirt and jeans carrying a gun. It wasn’t any of the men Joker had seen earlier. The man raised his gun but Joker fired first. The stranger got off one shot which ripped a chunk out of Joker’s shoulder, but Joker fired as he’d been trained to, two shots to the chest. Bang bang. The man’s arms slumped to the side and the gun fell to the floor, his mouth open in surprise. Two red splotches grew on his chest, so close that they formed a figure eight. Joker saw a door which seemed to lead to the outside. He aimed his gun at the lock but realised the gun was empty. He twisted the door handle and to his amazement it opened and he staggered outside, gulping in the cold night air. He fell to his knees, coughing and spluttering. He heard movement behind him and the man he’d shot fell out of the door, taking several unsteady steps and crashing face forward onto the grass. He smelled of burnt meat and his hair was smouldering. Joker rolled him over onto his back. He was still alive, but only just, and Joker knew there was nothing he or anyone could do to prolong his life. Both shots were smack in the centre of his chest.
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