block, and took off toward the
basement door.
It was all right as long as I was behind the six or
seven cars parked between me and the rear wall. But there was a good
twenty feet of open ground between that last car and the building,
and if the gunman were using an automatic he’d have at least one
shot left. So I crouched behind the last car for a second, trying to
catch my breath and praying that somebody in the building had heard
that bang that sounds like an amplified hand-clap or the thud and
tinkle of smashed glass. And, meanwhile, some not quite sane part of
me was busy calculating odds—one of those "if you do this, if
you don’t do that" conversations that didn’t sound quite
real even to me. If you don’t go down on the ice, Harry. If the
son-of-a-bitch is really out of ammunition. And if he’s not? Well,
he’d have the now to contend with, wouldn’t he? And then there
wasn’t much light coming from the basement door. And he was an
erratic shot. And the hard truth is that you won't stand a chance
where you are now. I took a deep breath, wiped the sweat out of my
eyes, and lit out.
It was a mistake. As soon as he saw me dash from
behind that last car, he raised both arms like a man in a stance and
began to fire again. Flames shot out of each coat sleeve this time.
The bullets kicked at the snow in front of me, making it leap as if
it were windblown and sparking brightly on the concrete beneath it.
Jesus Christ! I shrieked to myself. And then I did the obvious
thing—I shrieked it out loud, as loud as I could, and went
barreling like a semi, with its brakes gone and its whistles
screaming full-blast, through that little door and into the dark
concrete hallway, where I went down hard on my butt. I’d
practically taken the door off its hinges.
And either the gunman had knicked me with a lucky
shot or I’d put my hand through the glass insert in the door,
because when I caught my breath I realized there was blood on my left
arm.
I sat very still on that cold basement floor for a
few seconds—counting my blessings—then crept back up to the
window and peeked out at the lot. But the gunman was gone. So I said
a little prayer to Whoever is in Charge of These Things, made my way
to the apartment, and phoned the cops.
Even though there were only two other patients in the
emergency room at General Hospital—a young black kid in a
blood-spattered T-shirt and an old woman wrapped in a man’s
overcoat—it took the doctors over an hour to get to me, which gave
the patrolmen who had picked me up a chance to make time with the
duty nurses. Between passes, they got my story for the record. I gave
them as complete a description as I could of my assailant: a tall man
in a gray herringbone overcoat, with a green ski mask covering his
face, and at least three revolvers in his side pockets. But I guess I
couldn’t blame them for splitting their attention between me and
the nurses. That kind of description is known in the trade as "male
suspect armed" and isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.
Once in a thousand times, a cop will spot a felon who’s too stupid
to change his clothes; and, occasionally, a guy will be pulled in on
another charge and a gun or a mask will be found in his pockets. But
my attacker wasn’t going to be caught by chance, because my
attacker was a killer whose only target had been me. He wasn’t a
professional killer or, if he was, he was a damn poor shot. I figured
he was an amateur with a grudge. I figured he was either Sean O’Hara
or his black pal. What I couldn’t
figure
out was why.
I didn’t tell the cops about my speculations. I had
no proof to support them—only a feeling and the fact that O’Hara
had been following me earlier in the day. Anyway, by the time the
doctors finally got to me, the cops had lost interest entirely. When
I came out of the examination room with a bandaged left forearm, a
tetanus shot in my butt, and a bottle of Darvon in my hand, they’d
already
basement door.
It was all right as long as I was behind the six or
seven cars parked between me and the rear wall. But there was a good
twenty feet of open ground between that last car and the building,
and if the gunman were using an automatic he’d have at least one
shot left. So I crouched behind the last car for a second, trying to
catch my breath and praying that somebody in the building had heard
that bang that sounds like an amplified hand-clap or the thud and
tinkle of smashed glass. And, meanwhile, some not quite sane part of
me was busy calculating odds—one of those "if you do this, if
you don’t do that" conversations that didn’t sound quite
real even to me. If you don’t go down on the ice, Harry. If the
son-of-a-bitch is really out of ammunition. And if he’s not? Well,
he’d have the now to contend with, wouldn’t he? And then there
wasn’t much light coming from the basement door. And he was an
erratic shot. And the hard truth is that you won't stand a chance
where you are now. I took a deep breath, wiped the sweat out of my
eyes, and lit out.
It was a mistake. As soon as he saw me dash from
behind that last car, he raised both arms like a man in a stance and
began to fire again. Flames shot out of each coat sleeve this time.
The bullets kicked at the snow in front of me, making it leap as if
it were windblown and sparking brightly on the concrete beneath it.
Jesus Christ! I shrieked to myself. And then I did the obvious
thing—I shrieked it out loud, as loud as I could, and went
barreling like a semi, with its brakes gone and its whistles
screaming full-blast, through that little door and into the dark
concrete hallway, where I went down hard on my butt. I’d
practically taken the door off its hinges.
And either the gunman had knicked me with a lucky
shot or I’d put my hand through the glass insert in the door,
because when I caught my breath I realized there was blood on my left
arm.
I sat very still on that cold basement floor for a
few seconds—counting my blessings—then crept back up to the
window and peeked out at the lot. But the gunman was gone. So I said
a little prayer to Whoever is in Charge of These Things, made my way
to the apartment, and phoned the cops.
Even though there were only two other patients in the
emergency room at General Hospital—a young black kid in a
blood-spattered T-shirt and an old woman wrapped in a man’s
overcoat—it took the doctors over an hour to get to me, which gave
the patrolmen who had picked me up a chance to make time with the
duty nurses. Between passes, they got my story for the record. I gave
them as complete a description as I could of my assailant: a tall man
in a gray herringbone overcoat, with a green ski mask covering his
face, and at least three revolvers in his side pockets. But I guess I
couldn’t blame them for splitting their attention between me and
the nurses. That kind of description is known in the trade as "male
suspect armed" and isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.
Once in a thousand times, a cop will spot a felon who’s too stupid
to change his clothes; and, occasionally, a guy will be pulled in on
another charge and a gun or a mask will be found in his pockets. But
my attacker wasn’t going to be caught by chance, because my
attacker was a killer whose only target had been me. He wasn’t a
professional killer or, if he was, he was a damn poor shot. I figured
he was an amateur with a grudge. I figured he was either Sean O’Hara
or his black pal. What I couldn’t
figure
out was why.
I didn’t tell the cops about my speculations. I had
no proof to support them—only a feeling and the fact that O’Hara
had been following me earlier in the day. Anyway, by the time the
doctors finally got to me, the cops had lost interest entirely. When
I came out of the examination room with a bandaged left forearm, a
tetanus shot in my butt, and a bottle of Darvon in my hand, they’d
already
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