Once a Noble Endeavor

by Michael Butler

  “Tom, he is going to kill us. Who the hell is he?”

  “I’m not sure, but I think I know. Keep trying to get out of the tape.”

  Steven Clinton, fairly confident the occupants next door did not hear the indoor blast from the small shotgun more than a hundred feet away, went up the four steps to the front entranceway to check it out. As before, he looked inside, this time through a side panel of small windows adjacent to the big solid doorway, and saw Joann standing in the living room and eleven-year-old Elizabeth in pink pajamas lying on the sofa sleeping. Jodie with a small coat in hand was lifting the little girl’s right arm and threading it through the sleeve of the coat. Clinton, aroused at the sight of Brennan’s wife and with a new rush of adrenaline, kicked through the door with incredible force. He believed Nick might be in the house somewhere and he decided a quick forceful entry was the safest way to proceed with his evil designs, especially if Brennan had guns stored in the house. Brennan would no doubt quickly appear to investigate the loud noises on the base floor, and the psychopath knew that.

  The noisy entry awakened the startled child suddenly and Joann was almost knocked over by the force as the large character crashed into the room. Clinton immediately looked up the stairs. There was no movement on the second floor or any others visible on the main floor.

  “Where the hell is Nicholas Brennan?” he screamed in a deep voice as he pointed the shotgun at Jodie’s head. Elizabeth screamed out and began to cry. Joann was speechless. “Where the hell is Brennan?” he yelled again “Where the hell is he? I have been dreaming of this day for more than twenty years. I am going to kill that bastard right after I blow your goddamn legs off!”

  “He is not here,” Jodie said, sobbing. “He doesn’t live here.”

  “Don’t give me that shit. Whose wedding band is that you are wearing, you lying bitch!”

  “He lives back in New York.”

  Pointing the shotgun at the child, Clinton yelled out again, “Where the hell is Nicholas Brennan?” Elizabeth, afraid to lie, screamed out, “My daddy is coming home tonight! Please, don’t hurt me or my mommy!”

  Looking back at Joann in a low breathless voice, now with wild, watery eyes, he said, “Take your goddamn jeans off right now and sit down in that chair!” pointing into the adjoining room. Thoughts began to race through Joann’s mind. Was this a rape, a rape and murder—a rape and double murder. Trying to soothe Clinton, she softly said as she unfastened her front buttons and stepped out of her blue jeans, “Calm down, take it easy. Please calm down.”

  “Bring that chair from the kitchen and sit down in it right here,” he directed.

  Jodie, now barefoot in her black panties and a sleeveless top, carried the chair into the room and sat down in its brown upholstered seat. Working more quickly than before, Clinton immediately began to wrap Joann in the duct tape, pinning back her shoulders and arms, then her abdomen and lifting her top and wrapping tape around her hips. He raised the shotgun again and told Elizabeth to show him around the house. Elizabeth, shaking uncontrollably, went with the gunman and they both ascended the stairs as Joann tried to collect herself and her thoughts. He is probably going to kill all of us. He will kill Nicky as soon as he comes through the front door. How will I warn him?

  After a few minutes, satisfied that the house was indeed empty, Clinton returned to the living room with Elizabeth. He went to the front door and surveyed the damage he had done. I’ll just leave the door wide open, he thought. Brennan won’t see the busted door until he is already inside.

  “Okay, pretty lady, here is the drill. When Nicholas Brennan comes home tonight he is going to witness me shooting you with this goddamn shotgun in those gorgeous gams of yours, then I’m going to kill him. Maybe you will survive like I did. Want to see something?” he said as he pulled up the legs of his pants, exposing the gross, meandering scars all over both legs from the wounds and surgery. “If you want the little one to live, you will cooperate,” he said, lying. “That’s up to you, but Lieutenant Nicholas J. Brennan is dead! I am going to turn off that goddamn light. Sit still. Move, and the kid dies.”

  ****

  As the bus pulled into the empty bus station along the dark roadway, Nick looked around to see if Jodie had perhaps arrived a little early to pick him up. Hell, in twenty minutes I can walk home. I’ll probably catch her coming out of the driveway. Brennan began the short trek home along Route 23. After twenty minutes, as he turned up into the driveway, he noticed all the lights were off in both the houses. With no light, he’d have to walk a bit to see if the cars were there. After strolling on the gravel for two minutes, he could now see the cars parked where they usually were. Joann must have fallen asleep, he surmised.

  After another two minutes, as he began to walk past the carriage house, he looked up at the front door and thought one of the glass panes was shattered right above the door knob. Knowing he would hear the car if Joann came out, he decided to investigate. Maybe a burglary, probably not. When he looked inside, he saw nothing in the darkened room. He decided not to call out in case it was a burglary.

  As Nick slowly and quietly opened the unlocked door, he saw Carol’s head above the back of the couch. “Carol?”

  “Nicky! Oh, Nicky. Oh, thank God.”

  “What the hell is going on? Why are sitting there?”

  “Quiet, Nick,” Carol said, crying softy. “Quickly, we need help. He shot Tom, and I think he went into your house.”

  “Who—what—where is Tom?”

  “Quiet. I’m right here, Nick. I got shot in the shoulder. He’s got a shotgun. He went next door.”

  A feeling of panic overtaking him, Nick whispered, “Who shot you? Who went into my house?”

  “Nicky, I think it is Steve Clinton. The guy is not a robber or burglar. He’s big, has a limp, carries a sawed-off shotgun and he is erratic, insane. Get a knife in the kitchen in the left drawer by the sink and cut us loose.”

  Brennan ran into the adjoining room and came out with a kitchen knife. He quickly cut through the tape. Carol leapt to her feet and moved over to check Tom’s bleeding. The blood completely consumed the towel; it was now soaking wet and dark red. Carol applied direct pressure to the wound and directed Nick to get the masking tape in the top kitchen drawer.

  “Tommy, where is your gun?”

  “Clinton has it, and I saw him load it, but he didn’t rack it. He put it in his belt.”

  “Where do you think they are in the house?”

  “I don’t know, but probably the first floor, maybe the living room near the kitchen. He uses the kitchen chairs. He likely did the same thing at your house. I think he is waiting for you, Nick,” Tom said with a low discernible moan.

  Nick stopped and thought disjunctively for a second. “Did you hear any shots? Where is your cell phone?”

  “We listened carefully. No shots have been fired. He busted both our phones and the landline too,” Carol answered.

  “Carol, I don’t have my cell phone. I need you to run for help. Make a right on 23, none of the businesses are open, but there is a house about a mile and a quarter maybe a little more on the right. I think they are home. If you can, wave down a motorist. Get to the phone, tell the police Tom is an off-duty sergeant and I’m a retired cop working for the FBI. Describe the gunman so we don’t have any friendly fire incidents. Tell them no lights and sirens,” Nick said as he quickly wrapped the tape on Tom’s arm and shoulder to slow the bleeding.

  “Okay, I’ll run all the way,” Carol whispered as she left.

  “Tom, if that is Clinton, he is going to kill Joann and Elizabeth. Where is your ladder?”

  “Behind the garage on the ground. What are you going to do?”

  “Do you have any weapons, a big knife maybe?”

  “Yeah, on the bench in the garage a big hunting knife, a buck knife. What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to climb up the back of the house, get on the roof then go down one level and go in through the attic
window.”

  “That’s almost thirty-five feet up. You have to drop down ten.”

  “Yeah, I know, but grenades don’t roll upstairs. I would rather come down on the son of a bitch. I’ll scope it out first. If the cops get here in time, tell them where I am.”

  Running outside, Nicky quietly went into Tom’s pitch-black garage and felt around on the large wooden bench. Nothing. He stretched out his arm in the dark and moved down the length parallel to the tabletop and started knocking around screwdrivers, cans and a sharp saw blade. Shit, where the hell is the knife? Opening both hands, he began to search the bench palms down, sort of like splashing in a puddle. His left hand suddenly hit the molded handle and the extended blade. Got it. Nick took off his suit jacket and threw it to the floor and put the weapon in his belt on the right side.

  Outside in the back of the garage and easy to spot, the silver-colored aluminum extension ladder was lying neatly along the foundation wall. Nick grabbed it through the center rungs and silently carried it to the rear of the tall structure next door. Nick slowly, quietly and deliberately extended the device as he leaned it against the exterior wall in between the windows. With the rungs now against the wall, step by step pausing in between each, Nicky silently climbed up to the highest peak. Standing at the apex and looking out, he began to get dizzy as his stomach soured. Don’t look down. He began to lose his focus, the ground looked hazy as he peered below. Looking away, Nick decided to look outward laterally.

  At first walking softly one step at a time across the front of the roof line, in a concession to his weakness, he finally reluctantly got down on his knees, crawled towards the edge and grabbed the long metal drain pipe with his two hands. Throwing his left leg over the side, he began to dangle awkwardly, one leg on the roof, one in the air. Nick took a deep breath, looked up and nervously threw his right leg over to meet his left. Now with half his body hanging off the top of the building, he shimmied his hips back and forth over the shingles and drain pipe to move his legs lower and lower as he began to slip over the edge. Finally, with his arms fully extended and his elbows locked, he looked down to the level below. In the moonless night it seemed far more than ten feet, but it was too late to go back. He released his grip and with a thump landed outside the attic window on the third floor. He raised his eyes and whispered “shit” at the noise he had made. Nicky moved away from the window, expecting the gunman to take a look around. For a moment he heard nothing, then movement below.

  Inside, Clinton, with the gun pointed at Joann, heard the noise above and jumped to his feet. He said nothing and grabbed Elizabeth by the arm and went upstairs again. Searching all the rooms, including the attic, Clinton was confused. Dragging Elizabeth behind him, he cautiously went outside, looked left then right and then moved onto the lawn and cast the flashlight up onto the enormous roof. The light was more dispersed at the higher levels. He didn’t check the back of the house where the ladder was leaning against the house in the darkness. Nicky stayed in the shadows. They walked around the three perimeter walls as Clinton looked up. He didn’t see anything. He looked over at the DeBoers’ carriage house and saw nothing there as well. He figured he would have to see Brennan’s car approaching and that no one could’ve called the police, but he still didn’t like the suspicious sound.

  Inside once again, now more agitated and nervous than before, with the front door still swinging wide open, he loudly threatened Joann once more. “You listen to me, you bitch, if Lieutenant Brennan is not here within five minutes I’m going to blow your goddamn beautiful legs off and you can die right here in front of your kid.”

  Hearing the threat below, Nick saw stars. His hands shaking and his blood pressure rising, he tried to open the attic window. It was locked. He knew he had to break the glass, but that sound downstairs might cause Clinton, suspecting an assault, to shoot Jodie and Elizabeth. To perhaps draw his adversary away from Joann and Elizabeth, Brennan decided to make the same sound he had made before and listen for the maniac to come upstairs to again investigate the noise. Nicky jumped up and down on the roof one time.

  Clinton looked upstairs again, this time clearly distracted, oddly leaving Elizabeth behind, he turned on a light in the living room, illuminating the stairway and second floor and then quickly pulled himself up the flight of stairs. Joann, tears pouring down her face and looking up towards the ceiling, suspecting the DeBoers had probably been killed, softly said, “Elizabeth, run away. Run, baby, run down the driveway to the road and hide. Wait for a car. Look for Daddy.” Elizabeth, crying, touched her mother’s shoulder, and saying nothing ran out through the shattered open door.

  Flashlight in one hand and his shotgun in the other, Clinton entered and inspected the master bedroom, looked under the bed and slowly opened the sliding closet door. Then he went to the second bedroom and third bedroom and did the same. He looked inside the bathroom and looked out into the yard and down towards the ground from the window in the wall inside the tub and shower stall. After checking the last bedroom on the floor, he approached the stairway to the attic.

  Listening carefully he slowly and quietly ascended the twelve carpeted steps. He pushed open the doorway incrementally inch by inch; finally with his large head inside, he peeked and saw nothing. Clinton decided to look out through the window. Maybe an animal on the roof, he thought. He walked across the room, dragging his leg. Nick, with the knife in his right hand, positioned himself against the wall outside and waited for the flashlight to get closer. Just as Clinton reached to unlock the sash, he suddenly realized he had left Elizabeth free to escape and hurriedly began to turn to go downstairs. At that moment Brennan, with his eyes closed to protect his eyes, crashed through the glass with the knife extended towards his adversary’s neck.

  Clinton was knocked back on an oblique angle, but still standing he was able to raise the shotgun and hastily fire it in Nick’s direction using one hand. With the buckshot striking the unfinished wall, he missed the retired cop by three feet. Nicky, his head down, charged again, running the knife towards Clinton’s midsection. Both men fell to the floor near the head of the stairs with Nick on top of Clinton. Nicky’s momentum and the force of the action caused the knife to spring from Nick’s hand. The much larger and stronger Clinton dropped the shotgun at his side and picked up Brennan from his chest and like a rag doll tossed him over his head down the stairway. Nicky tumbled down, protected by the carpeting. Clinton, favoring his legs, rolled over slowly and unsteadily and reached for the gun. Brennan ran back up the stairs as Clinton juggled the weapon in both hands. Focused on the deadly instrument’s potential discharge, Brennan grabbed the barrel and pulled it away and pointed it down towards the lower floor. Both men lost their balance and rolled down the steps.

  On the second floor, the combatants wrestled over the shotgun. Standing over Clinton, Nicky viciously stomped the madman’s weak, disabled legs and finally pulled the weapon by the barrel from the monster’s hands. Aiming it away from himself, he threw it down to the first floor. The weapon struck the floor with a loud high-pitched crack and broke open at the breach between the small wooden stock and the metal trigger mechanism. It was probably rendered useless by the force of the fall, Nick assumed.

  Hearing the hollow sound of the breaking gun and thinking quickly, while lying on the floor, Clinton reached into his back waistband and pulled Tom DeBoer’s service pistol and raised it toward Nicky’s head. He pulled the trigger. Click. The chamber was empty. Brennan with both hands pushed the pistol back down in the opposite direction and struck his enemy below the right eye with the barrel end and twisted Clinton’s wrist, pulling the gun from his grasp. Straddling Clinton’s broad shoulders, Nick leaned back away from the psycho to chamber a round and finish the fight once and for all. Just as he forced the slide forward, Clinton again moved up at him and tried to pull the pistol out of Nick’s grip. The handgun, fully loaded with a round now in the chamber, slipped away and tumbled down the steps to the first floor, landing in the livin
g room directly in front of Joann.

  Both men crashed down the stairs in pursuit of the pistol. As Clinton, in front of Nick, was crawling across the floor and reaching for the handgun, Joann moved her legs forward, placed her feet around the weapon and pulled the pistol back under her chair as she shifted her weight forward intentionally, falling on top of the potential killer. Nick, landing with great force and a loud thud on the bare floor, jumped to his feet and grabbed a table lamp lying unbroken on the floor next to the sofa.

  Full of adrenaline, using his left hand Nick pulled Jodie upright off of Clinton as he pounded on the back of the maniac’s neck and head with the heavy ceramic fixture clenched in his right hand. To get Joann out of the line of fire, he forcefully slid her with her legs fully extended toward the front doorway. Clinton, face down, grabbed for the gun.

  Brennan moved instinctively, backing away as Clinton finally got a firm grasp on the automatic pistol. Clinton slowly, finally showing some physical weakness and exhaustion, pushed himself to his feet using his free hand. Standing upright as he steadily turned to shoot Nick, the back of his long, thick, injured legs were facing Joann.

  Nick and Joann both intuitively knew the large, powerful madman was essentially impervious to pain, yet they also knew something had to be done. Now by eye contact, somehow the couple conjured up a coordinated desperate plan of mutual action in only a moment. “Kick him, Jo,” Nick screamed out, “kick the shit out of the bastard!”