Blood on the Water Read online

Chapter 8

  Kyler yells a last inarticulate denial. His voice blends with my own hoarse cry.

  Orange-and-white flames explode from the muzzle. Endless, unbearable thunder clogs my ears to the bursting point. Doubling, tripling, the shocks tear into my side and out again.

  He falls back against the bar; nodding with each bullet's impact on his body.

  His cold eyes suddenly blaze to life, but it's an illusion. They turn inward to fix on a place where I cannot look-where I don't want to look. He slides to the floor.

  I stagger away from the dying man. Smoke and bloodsmell overtake me. We merge into nothingness, turning, tumbling, free of gravity, free of thought, free of the first awful crash of agony. I twist and soar high in blind flight.

  Chaven circles below. He and the other man cast about with broken questions, curses, and anguish. Drawn by the shots, more people rush in. Like a detached spirit with only vague interest in their little problems, I hover above the confusion.

  Their voices fade. I seep through a wall, seeking another, more tranquil place, away from their alarms and fears.

  Stumbling awkwardly into a pink marble counter, I came back to myself with a stomach-lurching jolt. Gravity reasserted its claim on my body, trying to drag me into, and perhaps through, the floor. I fought it, needing to feel my own solidity, my own movements, needing the instinctive assurance that I still lived. .

  My hands clawed at the cool marble as though it were a life preserver. I stayed and was numbly thankful for the privilege.

  I'd wound up in a fancy lounge. A huge mirror over the counter reflected gold walls where brass lamps clung like glowing cicadas. As usual, it missed me, but I had no interest in knowing what I looked like. Turning from its emptiness, I was busy just trying to keep my shaky legs under me. I'd been shot before, but not so many times all at once, not to such a point of shattering, sickening weakness.

  The bloodsmell clinging to me was my own. Morbidly, I counted four holes going into the right side of my pea jacket and another four raggedly emerging from the left, the fabric soaked with warm red stains, and my guts still churning sharply from the aftershock. Chaven had made a good grouping-too bad he couldn't have known they'd go right through me and on to kill Kyler.

  He's dead.

  I braced more firmly against the counter, locking my knee joints to offset their tremors. The initial shock threatened to turn into a nauseous disaster, but I gulped it back and sucked stuffy air into my neglected lungs. It shuddered out as soft, nervous laughter that did not want to stop. Some distant part of my brain was aware that it didn't sound quite right, but the restraints were broken down. It hurt too much to hold back and continued for as long as the air lasted, ugly, mirthless whispers of relief. After too many frantic nights crowded with uncomfortable thoughts, I needed the release badly. It washed over me, a wave of sweet, soothing balm for a troubled soul. It washed over and past, leaving me weary and drained, but at peace.

  I was finally free of the bastard.

  A last little surge of laughter flowed away from me, soft and secret.

  He's dead.

  He was someone else's problem, now. And I was just cynical enough to be glad about it.

  Next door, the clearly audible aftermath of Chaven's mistake was just beginning.

  But he was quick to adjust to the new situation, especially since his own skin was at risk. Within a very few minutes he managed to invent a plausible story of how I'd burst in with a gun to fulfill my own contract on Kyler and escaped. The room quickly cleared as he sent his cronies out to search for me and to explain away the commotion to any roadhouse patrons who might have heard something odd happening upstairs.

  Then I had to disappear for a time as two of his goons charged in to check the stalls for my presence.

  "You believe that b. s. he fed us?" one of them asked as they crashed around.

  "Long as we get our cut of the profits, who cares? We do what he says and make him happy. "

  "And if we find this guy he was talking about?"

  "Then we give him a bad case of lead poisoning. C'mon, what's the holdup?"

  "Just lookin'. I never been in one of these places before. I thought the pots'd be shaped different or something. "

  "The only difference is that some of ours are on the wall and all of theirs are on the floor. "

  That explained the pink marble; I was in a ladies' lounge.

  "Live 'n' learn. "

  "C'mon. "

  The door banged shut.

  When I came back I felt much more tired than before, but better able to think.

  If those two were a typical example of the kind of loyalty Kyler had inspired in his troops, Chaven had little to worry about in the reprisals department from underlings. But he was still one to watch out for as far as I was concerned, since more than ever he had a damn good reason to keep it a personal fight between us.

  On the other hand, there was every possibility that he wasn't the same kind of crazy as his deceased boss. I might be more successful reasoning with him.

  I pressed an ear to the adjoining wall to see if he was alone yet, but no such luck, and no wonder. With an invisible God-knows-what wandering around the house he'd want to have an army around him for protection. As it was, he'd settled for one man-one too many for the moment. The kind of hypnosis that I had in mind required a certain degree of privacy. I'd have to wait.

  To better hear what was going on I went back through the wall, giving the spot where Kyler had dropped a wide berth. It wasn't out of respect for the dead; nervous superstition was a better description for my caution. There was no telling what, if anything, I might encounter in this ethereal form and I had no desire to find out. I found a quiet corner and listened to the hollow voices of the living that remained.

  "Now what?" asked one unfamiliar to me.

  "What d'ya mean?" Chaven returned. He seemed to be standing near Kyler, perhaps looking down at the corpse.

  "I mean about him. You ain't callin' the cops on this. . . "

  "Hell, no. "

  "Then wake up and start thinking. "

  Chaven's voice was ragged. "Can it, Deiter, I am. "

  During the shooting, I'd had only the barest glimpse of a man standing behind Chaven. He had to have been Deiter, the specialist Kyler had ordered up to take care of the hit on Gordy, and now the only other witness to the strange circumstance of Kyler's death. One more name to put on the roster of people to be persuaded to forget all about me.

  "We take him out to the boat," Chaven finally said. "We get a box and weights and sink him just like any other job. We take him way out and we do it tonight. "

  "What about your gun?"

  "What about it?"

  "The bulls got ways of tracing bullets. If they should ever-"

  "Yeah, okay, it goes in the drink with him. I can always get another. " Pause.

  "Like maybe this one. "

  "What the hell is it?" Deiter had to be talking about Escott's Webley. It was a unique-looking hunk of hand artillery.

  "Something that shoots. I don't think the boss'll mind me taking it back again. "

  "Fat lotta good it did him. What happened, Chaven? How could you shoot that guy and hit the boss? What happened to the guy? I had both eyes right on him and he just stopped being there. "

  Chaven moved away toward the desk where the book lay. "Here. You figure it out. "

  Deiter followed. "Invisible? You pulling my leg?"

  "The boss was checking into it. He said the guy in the book made himself invisible with chemicals. He had the idea that this guy Fleming knew how to do the same thing, only he could turn it on and off like-like a light bulb, clothes and all. "

  "That's crazy. "

  "If it ain't this, then what else?"

  "You can shoot through ghosts, can't you?" Deiter hazarded.

  "I don't believe in ghosts. You saw what happened. Well, didn't
you?"

  "Yeah, I already said so. I just wanna know what I saw. "

  "A guy disappearing. "

  "But it don't make sense. "

  "It don't have to-but that's how it is. And the worst part is that bastard could be in here right now. "

  That ominous idea must have made Deiter a sudden believer. Things got very quiet for a while. "What are you going to do about him?"

  "One thing at a time. First we clean up this mess on the floor. "

  "You got a story ready for Kyler's bosses?"

  "Just what I told the boys here; he put a hit out on Fleming, only Fleming got him first. We stick to that and we keep our skins. "

  "What about his family?"

  "He didn't have any that he wanted. He told me he left them behind and wanted to keep it that way. "

  "Maybe the wife skipped to Reno," Deiter sniggered.

  "Who knows? I think any skirt would have been crazy to get cozy with him. I was the closest thing he had to a friend and I didn't like him all that much. "

  "Guess it's just as well we're gonna sink him. You'd do a lousy job talking at his funeral. "

  "Can it, Deiter. In fact, you can everything you heard and saw in here. If you want to stay out of the loony bin you don't say a word about invisible men to nobody. "

  "This mean you're running the show now?"

  "Until and unless the other bosses say otherwise. The boys'll follow my lead long as they get their money as usual. . . oh, shit. "

  "What?"

  "We gotta get Opal back. She's the only one who can make head or tail of the books. Without them, I'm crippled. "

  "But you don't know where-"

  "I'm laying odds that Fleming's got his partner holding her, and this town ain't so big that they can hide forever. I'll have Calloway look into things from his side.

  Wouldn't it be something if we got the cops to do our work for us?"

  "If you can trust him. "

  "He's in too deep and likes the money too much to turn on us now. "

  "You hope. What about the problem down the hall? We can't keep that spook in private stir forever. "

  Chaven's new responsibilities were starting to irritate him. "Jesus, why don't you just make a list? I'll get to him when I can. "

  "Right, boss. "

  The use of his new title mollified him somewhat and they left the room to set things in motion. I went solid almost as the door shut.

  Kyler had fallen on his face, but they'd rolled him over, presumably to check for signs of life, and left him that way. His eyes were still open. The rug was thick with his blood, and the cold, dizzy scent of it teased my nose. I tried to ignore it as I borrowed the phone on the desk.

  It was a relief to know that my call to Escott wouldn't be long distance and therefore traceable. I'd been worried that Calloway had driven over the state line to Indiana or had at least left Cook County. The other end of the wire began ringing for attention.

  And kept on ringing. Where the hell was he?

  I dialed the number again, more slowly in case I'd gotten it wrong the first time.

  And again, to make sure. No answer. My mouth had grown very dry. Then I had to hang up and disappear when a couple of Chaven's men came in to dispose of the body. From their lazily bickering conversation, they would be taking their time on this job. I hurled out past them to find another phone. One of them complained miserably about cold drafts and began sneezing.

  Random searches are neither fast nor efficient and that much more difficult when you can't see where you're going. There might have been any number of phones handy downstairs, but I wasn't dressed for fancy socializing. I'd be spotted in short order and either thrown out on my ass by the bouncers or shot again. Both possibilities would prevent me from letting Escott know what was going on, and worse, from finding out what had happened to him.

  I took a turn up the hall, bumped through a door, and swept the room for occupants. Clear. Solid again, I checked the place in one fast look. No phone, dammit. I did the same thing once more, twice more, finding either people or not finding a phone. Jeez, when you're making love or taking a bath the damn things are ringing off the wall for you, but when you really need one they vanish like roaches when the lights come on.

  One more try. I materialized in a vacant meeting room with a long dark table and padded chairs all around. Some unsung genius had thought to install a phone and I took immediate advantage of the fact.

  Or tried to. Just as I was dialing the last number, a door at the far end slowly swung open. There was nothing else to do but drop the earpiece back and disappear. I clearly recalled that in the movie, Claude Rains had himself endured a frustrating lack of privacy.

  The impromptu investigator seemed to be alone and only stayed long enough to check the place and maybe puzzle over its emptiness. Unhappily for me he left the door ajar, the better to hear any more suspicious noises. I gave out an internal and quite silent sigh and materialized to do some listening for myself. He was alone. I decided that it wouldn't hurt for him to enjoy a short nap while I completed my call.

  Taking a direct and low-key approach, I just walked in on him. Leaping out of thin air might have been more dramatic, but for this kind of work, the less ruckus, the better.

  My unsuspecting victim stood in the middle of a square of rug, staring at it. I was ready for him to hear me and turn, but he took no notice. He was a stocky man, but his cheap hickory shirt and rough pants hung loose on his frame as though he'd lost a lot of weight. His clothes didn't fit this place any more than mine did. Head still down, he traced the outline of the rug's pattern with the blunt toe of his shoe. This simple and childish activity in a middle-aged man brought a rush of prickles to the back of my neck. Deiter had mentioned a "spook"; maybe I'd found him. If so, then he might prove to be as immune to suggestion as Kyler.

  Deciding to not take the chance, I began to quietly back out. The man, still tracing, had gradually turned. I froze, held fast by wide, wasted eyes and a scraped-out expression. He glanced at me without concern, his pasty face and subdued manner much too calm. To him, I was just another part of the furnishings, somewhat less interesting than the rug, for he continued with his infantile game.

  Recognition reluctantly burst upon me. Last summer, while subjecting a man to hypnotic influence, I'd lost control of my emotions. The anger, frustration, pain, and roaring hatred buried deep by the shock of my own death had been released like a lightning bolt into another's mind, with predictable effect. This soft, helpless husk before me was all that was left of Frank Paco.

  I was frozen with apprehensive shock. . . and fascinated.

  "Paco?" I ventured, not really knowing why.

  "Yes?" he unexpectedly replied.

  After a minute I was able to speak again. "Do you know me?"

  His toe began to trace a different pattern in the rug, one that only he could see.

  He paused to give me a good look. Something flickered over his face, perhaps the corpse light of a dead memory. "You were on the boat. "

  So he recalled my last hell-filled days aboard the Elvira. "Anywhere else?"

  He shrugged. I rubbed a hand over my rough jaw. Maybe my unkempt appearance now was misleading him. He might not be able to link me with the younger-looking intruder who had dynamited his basement and subsequently blasted away his sanity. On the other hand, why was it so important to me for Paco to recall that encounter? The answer came even as I thought up the question.

  Here was Kyler's other source of information on me.

  I fought down the sudden tremors running out from my spine and backed away from him without thinking. Stupid reaction, I thought, and made myself stop.

  Paco didn't seem to notice.

  The boardroom phone was as safe as any for the moment. Paco was too far gone to be much of a danger to me now. I dialed the number once more and this time got an answer, but not the one I expected. It was Shoe Co
ldfield and I didn't have to hear the tone of his voice to know that something was wrong. "This is Fleming. Where's Charles?"

  "Shit if I know. When he didn't answer the phone I came over to check on him and he's not here. Where the hell are you?"

  "A roadhouse somewhere outta town. Was the building broken into?"

  "Looks it; I don't think the's. o. b. got bored and took off leaving the door hanging open. "

  Damnation. "No, he wouldn't, not unless he was on the run, and my guess is that he'd call you for help at the first chance. " My belly churned as the right idea hit me. "If he had one. "

  "What do you know, Fleming?" he growled.

  "Did Charles tell you about me finding Opal?"

  "Kyler's accountant? Yeah, he told me all about her and the hit on Gordy.

  Maybe he decided to follow you-no, if he was watching that girl, nothing would have budged him outta here. "

  "They must have been watching the Travis Hotel for Kyler when I showed up.

  They had to have followed me while I was busy trying to keep Opal quiet-then they got in and got to Charles. "

  "Who followed you? Who got in?" he demanded.

  "It has to be Angela Paco's people. "

  This time he said nothing and I couldn't blame him. The situation was rapidly growing beyond words.

  "I've found out why Angela put herself in the middle of things last night. It's her father. Kyler's been keeping Frank Paco under wraps. "

  "Frank Paco? What the hell for?"

  "Pumping him for information about me, I guess. "

  "But Paco's been bughouse crazy since that fire. What can he know that would be of any use?"

  "Doesn't matter anymore-Kyler's dead. "

  He paused a long time on that one and there was a hint of respect in his reaction. "Took care of him, huh?"

  "Not me, his lieutenant. Chaven did the honors. Right now I'm busy keeping my head down while he's covering things up. "

  "How the hell did you arrange it?"

  "Believe me, it was an accident. Chaven's still after my hide, but forget him, Angela's our main worry now. I think the reason she kidnapped me the other night was to make a trade for her father. She might be trying to do the same again, but this time with Charles and Opal, so there's a good chance that they're all right. " I purposely skipped over the fact that of the two, Opal was the more valuable hostage.

  "Only now she won't be dealing with Kyler-if this is what you think it is. "

  "You just said that Charles wouldn't budge otherwise. Check around, see if there's anyone else besides the Kyler and Paco factions that are after us. "

  "I know there aren't. Yet. "

  "Right. My bet's that Angela's probably got them both and will be making her demands soon. Chaven's got his hands full at the moment and I don't know which way he'll jump on this, but he'll want Opal back because he needs her for his business. "

  "But Charles will be in the soup if she makes that deal. How long will it take you to get back here?"

  "I'm not, I'm going straight to her place. "

  "If she's still there. "

  "You know any other bolt holes Paco had that Kyler didn't take over?"

  "Okay. But I'm coming out, too. "

  Fine with me. I wouldn't mind having Coldfield guarding my back. We made quick arrangements on where to meet and I told him to give me at least an hour to get there. I hung up, ready to race for the nearest car.

  Frank Paco stood in the doorway, his eyes narrowing and a little less empty than before. "What's all this about mia Angelina?'

  "Nothing. "

  "Nothing, what?" he rumbled, a faint shadow of his old authority returning.

  I made a bald guess on what was expected. "Nothing, Mr. Paco. "

  "You goddamn well better believe it. You boys don't say nothing against Angela. She's a good girl and I taught her how to stay that way. "

  "Yes, Mr. Paco. Have you seen her lately?"

  "She's around the house somewhere. What d'you need to know for?"

  "Uh. . . I heard she had an errand for me, is all. "

  "You go find her, then. You don't have her look for you. Remember that working for Angela is the same as working for me. "

  "Yes, sir. "

  "What're you doing in here like this, anyway? I don't pay you punks to dress like bums. Get out and get a shave. "

  "Yes, Mr. Paco. " I wished for the time to question him myself, but he was getting loud, and I had to be elsewhere fast. I made my escape while I could.

  Initially, I thought of "borrowing" a car from some randomly unlucky patron, but once outside, Kyler's twin Cadillacs popped back to mind and were too much of a temptation to pass up. I found them as they'd been parked, nose out and all ready to go. Locked or not, I slipped inside one and fumbled around with the wires to get it started. The soft, secretive purr of its well-tuned motor was an added bonus; no one in the house would hear my departure. While it warmed, I devoted some attention to the other car.

  Both were beautiful machines; it wasn't their fault they'd caught the eye of someone like Kyler, so I drew the line at breaking the headlights off or any other obvious, crippling vandalism. Deflating tires was easy and effective enough; I stuck with what I knew best. The angry hiss of compressed air was loud, but nobody came out to check things. As soon as the rims were flush with the gravel, I took off, leaving behind the road-house palace and its dismayed and murderous senechals.

  It took a full hour and then some to get there, and then I had to cruise slowly so as not to miss the spot off the road where Coldfield said he'd be waiting. In the summer it was sheltered by thick shrubs; now only black, branchy skeletons remained, clutching their tattered leaves like precious memories being dragged along to the grave. Despite their thin ranks and my excellent night vision, I had to look carefully before finding Coldfield's Nash.

  My headlights were on so as not to annoy the traffic cops, so he naturally spotted me first. But I was startled at how fast he emerged from his car and downright alarmed when he crouched behind the armored door to point his gun in my direction. One of his men dropped out the driver's side, nervously copying him.

  Maybe stealing one of Kyler's highly identifiable Caddies hadn't been such a good idea, after all. Belatedly, I hit the brakes, doused the lights, and rolled down the window to shout at him.

  He recognized my voice and cautiously emerged. "You alone, Fleming?" he demanded, meaning that I'd damn well better be.

  "Yeah," I wheezed, recalling how he hated surprises. I cut the motor and got out slowly. "Just me, myself, and I. "

  He finally put away the gun and came over to glare at the Caddy. "How the hell did you manage this one?"

  "The other car had bad tires. "

  He barked out an unexpected laugh and thumped me on the back so hard that I nearly fell over. "All right, let's work out what needs to be done. "

  It seemed pretty plain to me. "First I find out if they're there, then I go get them. "

  "While I twiddle my thumbs?"

  "I know the inside of the house. "

  "So does Isham," he said, with a brief gesture toward the Nash, where his driver waited. "He helped with the catering of a lot of parties there, once. "

  I could see that we were heading for a long argument, so I gave in, up to a point. "Okay, but we can't all three go in or Angela will have more hostages than she knows what to do with. " Or targets, I added to myself. "How about Isham comes with me and you hang back and cover us?"

  "Not too far back," he rumbled. "We'll move up close to the front gate with the car. I'm not crazy about a walk through the woods in this weather. "

  The wind was light, but dismal to stand in. We hustled into the temporary protection of the Nash and Isham got it in gear.

  "Just how did you take care of Kyler?" Coldfield asked.

  I gave him an almost truthful story, leaving out a few important points about invisibility,
failed hypnosis, and saying that I ducked and ran when Chaven started shooting. It was one of my more demandingly creative efforts.

  "You must know how to run pretty damn fast," he commented, but left it at that. We'd once shared a nasty street brawl together and he apparently remembered that I could really move when sufficiently inspired.

  Isham stopped and set the brake. "Ready," he said, his inflection so neutral that I couldn't tell if it was a statement or a question.

  We got out and checked the lock on the front gates. It wasn't much, just a length of chain with a padlock holding it together, a bit down in the world from the armed guards and dogs that once patrolled the place. Maybe Angela could no longer afford them. Isham got some large bolt cutters from the trunk and snapped open a key link. Coldfield took charge of them and wished us luck as we slipped inside.

  It was a long trudge down the gravel drive to the house, or perhaps the wind only made it seem so. I didn't mind much, but Isham looked pretty miserable, and things would only get worse for him before too long.

  Lights glowed in some widely separated windows, but we paid more attention to the dark ones. If Angela had anyone on lookout duty, they'd be hiding here.

  Nobody yelled, though, so we moved on like we belonged until we came to the inadequate shelter of a work shed. It was locked up, but the clapboard sides of the building cut the wind down to nothing, which was very fortunate for Isham.

  Our parting conversation was brief, onesided, but absolutely necessary. I left him awake and alert, but had persuaded him to stay behind. Better for him to wait for my return than to have both of us in the house dodging around for cover that might not exist. It worked out fine for him; he thought it was all his idea. As for me, all I got was the start of a really nasty headache.

  Free of Isham, I was able to move much faster and had no need to conceal my supernatural abilities. Rounding the nearest corner of the house, I vanished and forced my way through one of the many windows. Glass isn't my favorite material to sieve past; it's like falling through the ice in a pond, only the ice doesn't actually break. I always expect it to, though, which is why I usually avoid it. Tonight I was in too much of a hurry to bother. Wish I had; the extra effort took its toll on my head when I materialized on the other side.

  The room I stood in was unfamiliar, but deserted. The lights were out in this wing of the house. Angela was either saving on the bills or the repairs hadn't gotten as far as fixing the wiring here yet. I picked my way around water -damaged furniture and eased open the door. The hinges creaked, but not too loudly. The hall was clear.

  Trusting my ears and eyes to keep me out of trouble with the tenants, I checked likely and unlikely rooms on the ground floor. Some were untouched by fire and water, others were still a mess, and a few were in a halfway stage of repair.

  None of them were presently occupied. I blamed the late hour and could guess that Angela's boys were upstairs tucked away in their beds.

  Wrong. Two of them were raiding the kitchen icebox for beer and sandwiches.

  They sounded oddly domestic as they cut bread and searched for the bottle opener, but their talk gave no clue about Escott. I was about to slip off when instead of sitting at the table to eat, they loaded everything onto a tray and went down another hall.

  Long experiences had taught me that it was anatomically impossible to kick oneself. I settled for giving them a good start and cat-footed after them.

  They were going to the private gymnasium. Vanishing, I rushed ahead to scour the place and found two people there, one stretched out on a table and the other sitting close by. Neither was doing much of anything. Fine and dandy. I whipped into the steam room where Newton had stashed me earlier and got my hunch paid off.

  "Jack?" came Escott's inquiring whisper as I brushed past him.

  He was alone. With some difficulty, I re-formed; this time my head was so bad that I staggered smack into one of the benches, barking my shins painfully against the wood. Twisting, I dropped onto the seat with a jolt. Rough landing, but at least I was still in one piece.

  "That sudden chill was not my imagination, then," he said. "Are you all right?"

  "Dizzy. All this Houdini stuff takes it out of me. "

  "Well, it is good to see you, my friend. "

  I was surprised that he could. In addition to the scrapes and black eye he'd already collected, his other eye was swollen shut and he held one arm protectively against himself. His long legs were drawn up on the bench, helping him to keep his back braced in a tiled corner. He was white to the hairline and looked about as steady as a guttering candle.

  I forgot about my own troubles. "Holy shit, what happened to you?"

  His mouth twitched. "Opal," he said dryly. "And, to a lesser extent, Miss Paco. I fear that one day a woman may prove to be my ultimate downfall. "

  "It's my fault, Charles. I wasn't careful enough about watching for tails when I brought Opal in. "

  He gave a minimal shrug with his eyebrows. "So I deduced when they broke into the building. "

  "Jeez, what else did they break? Your arm?"

  "I think not, bad bruise at the worst, but I've a devil of a pain along the ribs.

  They'll need taping, I'm sure. "

  "Who hit you?"

  "Opal. . . with a packing crate. Damn good luck for me that she did or I'd have come to a bad end then and there. Angela Paco was that close to blasting me into the next world. "

  "Good God. "

  "No doubt He has spared me for some other purpose for which consideration I am truly thankful. No, please don't try to help, I've just got comfortable. "

  "I'm sorry. " An apology had never seemed so inadequate before.

  He waved it away. "Hardly your fault, old man. It's part of the job. I hope that you're here to help get me away from this place?"

  "Only by the shortest possible route. Isham's just outside the house and Shoe's got a car waiting at the gate. "

  "Excellent," he sighed with quiet approval.

  "Where's Opal?"

  "With Miss Paco, I think. They left me in here some time ago. Is Gordy all right? And what about Miss Smythe?"

  "Yeah. They're fine. "

  "And Vaughn Kyler?"

  It was hard work to talk about that subject, but I did give him a very short summary of what I'd been through. "Chaven must have gotten the worst surprise of his life when Kyler dropped," I concluded.

  Escott exhaled a long breath and tilted his head back against the wall. "What a gift for understatement the gentleman has. "

  "It's still not over. "

  "True. But you sound better able to handle it. "

  "I sure as hell don't feel it. "

  "You do look rather done in. Perhaps Shoe was right about taking a vacation.

  A few weeks in the Mexican sun would surely be of far less harm to you than all this bother has been. "

  If I'd had the energy, I might have laughed at that one. Instead, I got to my feet with a groan and went to work again.

  He watched me through one slitted eye as I prowled to the small set-in window to get a look at the mugs outside. The door was secured shut this time; I had to settle for a sideways glance through the little square of double-paned glass, but it was enough. Newton, Lester, and some other guy out of the same mold were draped on various exercise benches, putting away the beer and sandwiches. They were making too much talk among themselves to notice our whispered conversation. Near them on the massage table lay Vic, lone survivor of last night's interrupted kidnapping. He was wrapped up in a ton of bandaging and looked asleep.

  "Now what about you?" I asked, turning back. "What's your story?"

  He frowned. "Well, it's all so bloody embarrassing, isn't it? Though I'm content now that things turned out as they did. The alternative Miss Paco had in mind hardly bears thinking about. "

  "Charles. . . "

  "Yes. Well. They broke open the door below, and tha
t awakened Opal from her slumber. I must say the girl recovered herself rather well. She immediately assumed that it was her employer come to rescue her and delayed me for a few crucial moments. She made a devil of a row and that brought the intruders straight up the stairs. "

  "No time to shoot?"

  Another grimace. "More like a catastrophic lack of inclination. The first one up was Miss Paco herself. I was ready, but damn it, I just couldn't bring myself to kill a woman. . . a girl, really. While I hesitated, Opal hit me from the side with that bloody packing case and inadvertently saved my life by getting in Miss Paco's line of fire. I'm not sure what followed, but the next thing I knew I was at the bottom of the stairs with the breath knocked right out of me and unable to move.

  Eventually Opal realized her mistake, Miss Paco got things sorted out, and we were all bundled into a truck and brought here. "

  "They say why?"

  "No. " He correctly read my expression. "You've learned something?"

  I told him about Frank Paco.

  "Well, well," he said after a moment.

  "Is that what you'd call 'a spanner in the works'?" I asked.

  "More like the whole tool kit. No, strike that. Frank Paco's involvement only lends complete logic to his daughter's actions. If anything, it's Kyler's unexpected death that will cause the greatest disruption. "

  "That's what I came up with, but it might not change stuff that much. Chaven still needs Opal back, and I figure he'll want to bump you off just to make a neat package, so you two have got to get out of here before all hell breaks loose. "

  He readily agreed. "To that end I suggest you locate Opal next, and from there we may work out a practical exit from this place. "

  I wasn't crazy about leaving him alone now that I'd found him. "I don't know about that. "

  He made a deprecatory gesture at the bare walls. "The decor is somewhat lacking in interest, but I can survive it a while longer. As for those fellows outside, I'm content that they shall continue to ignore me as long as I remain quiet. Do go on and find the young lady; I'll be safe enough here. "

  My friend, the optimist. Movement outside caught my eye. I pressed my face against the glass for a better look.

  "What is it?" he asked.

  "Doc just came in. I may have to get scarce. "

  Out of his bathrobe and into a suit, Doc gave the illusion of sobriety until you saw his face. His eyes were bright but wandering, and his arms swung long and loose. His legs were still steady, so he was probably good for a few more miles, yet.

  "It's time," was all he said.

  Newton and Lester finished off their beer and got up. Without hurry, they went to Vic and pulled him to his feet. He wouldn't stay there. His head rolled, dropping to his chest as they dragged him out. Doc trailed after them.

  I glanced at Escott. "They just took Vic for a walk. What say we do the same?"

  "And Opal?"

  "I'll come back for her later. Right now there's only one guy watching things. A better chance might not turn up again. "

  He gave out with a twitch of the lips and a very small nod. I think he was too done in to argue much on Opal's behalf; that or he figured she owed him one for braining him so hard.

  I started to slip away, but the familiar dissolving of self into weightless nothing would not come. The effort brought back the dizziness, and I had to grab my now thundering head with both hands. It felt like someone had rammed a spike right into my brain.

  "What is it?" Escott demanded softly.

  "Tired," I mumbled. I could hardly hear myself. After a few moments, the roaring subsided a little and I pushed out a few more words. "Been doing this too much. Tired. "

  "Perhaps a trip to the Stockyards would not be amiss," he suggested, an uneasy tone to his voice.

  "Yeah. " Simple to say, hard to fulfill, but a long drink was what I needed. I thought of that while giving myself a minute to figuratively catch my breath. When I felt ready, I tried again.

  Nothing.

  I'd anticipated either vanishing or more pain, but not this. For the first time in months a layer of sweat broke out on me, flaring over my entire body, and settling around my flanks and groin. "They turn the heat on in here?" I whispered thinly.

  But Escort could see something was seriously wrong and that the joke was meant to cover my fear. "Sit down, Jack. You look ghastly. "

  I didn't have much choice in the matter. My legs sagged all on their own, and with my back to the door for support, I slid right to the tiles.

  Despite his damaged ribs, Escott got over to me. He knew better than to check for a pulse, but did get a hard look at my face. It must have been bad news.

  "How do you feel?"

  "Like hell with a hangover. " I raised a lax hand to swipe at the sweat on my forehead. An abrupt whiff of my own scent came to me from the motion. It was faint, but unmistakable. You know it by instinct and you never, never forget it: the warm, sweet, rotten stink of death.