Lee CHILD - Better off Dead

Dr. Houllier retrieved his shoe, dropped his ruined lab coat in the trash, straightened his tie, and led the way to his parking spot. A Cadillac was sitting in it. It was white. Maybe from the 1980s. It was a giant barge. It looked like it should have been in a soap opera, with cattle horns on its hood. Dr. Houllier climbed in. I watched him drive away then found my way back to the ambulance bay. The Lincoln was still there, exactly where I left it. I was relieved. Ever since I found Dr. Houllier on the morgue floor, a worry had been nagging at the back of my mind. I figured there was a chance Dendoncker’s guy had come across it when he was looking for me.

I opened the back door. The guys in the suits were awake. Both of them. They started wriggling. Trying to get out. Or trying to get me. And also trying to speak. I couldn’t understand what they wanted to say. I guess their jaws were messed up. I took the scalpel out of my pocket and held it up so they would be clear what it was. I tossed it behind the guy in the darker suit’s back, on the floor, where he could reach it. I threw Mansour’s keys in after it. Then I closed the door and went back inside. I hurried to the main entrance. Passed the woman with the pearls. Crossed under the globe and the dome and emerged onto the street. I looped around the outside of the building to the place where I’d left the Caprice. It was in a gap between two smaller, municipal-style buildings diagonally opposite the ambulance bay’s gate. I pushed a dumpster in front of it. It wasn’t great cover but it obscured the car a little. It was better than nothing.

It took me four and a half minutes to get from the Lincoln to the Chevy. After another nine I saw the ambulance bay gates twitch. They began to slide open. I started the Chevy’s motor. As soon as the gap between the two halves was wide enough the Lincoln burst out onto the street. It turned right, so it didn’t pass in front of me. I waited two seconds. That wasn’t nearly long enough, but it was as long as I could risk in the circumstances. I swung around the dumpster and turned to follow.

The conditions were terrible for tailing anyone. I was in a car that might well be recognized. There was no traffic to use as cover. I had no team members to rotate with. The streets were twisty and chaotically laid out so I had no option but to keep close. Which was easier said than done. Whoever was driving the Lincoln knew where he was going. He knew the route. He knew when to turn. When to accelerate. When to slow down. And when he didn’t have to.

I was pushing the Chevy as hard as I could but the Lincoln was still pulling away from me. It took a turn, fast. I lost sight of it. I leaned harder on the gas. Harder than I was comfortable with. The car pitched on its worn springs and the tires squealed as I barreled around a bend. A cardinal error when you’re trying to avoid drawing attention. I made it around another tight curve. The tires squealed again. But the noise didn’t give me away. Because there was no one to hear it.

There was no sign of the Lincoln. Just empty pavement leading to a T-junction. I leaned on the gas harder still, then slammed on the brakes. The tires squealed again and I stopped with the hood sticking out into the perpendicular street. There was a little store in front of me. It sold flowers. A woman was tending to the window display. She glared at me then retreated from sight. I looked right. I looked left. There was no trace of the Lincoln. There were no signs to suggest that one way led to a more popular destination. No marks on the pavement to indicate one way carried more traffic. No clue to tell me which way the other car had gone.

I knew I was facing west. So if I turned left, the road would take me south. Toward the border. Which was another dead end. If I turned right, it would take me north. It would maybe loop back to the long road past The Tree. To the highway. Away from the town. Away from Dendoncker and his goons and his bombs. But also away from Fenton.

I turned left. The road opened out. Stores and businesses gave way to houses. They were low and curved and roughly rendered. They had flat roofs with the ends of wide, round beams protruding from the tops of their walls. Their windows were small and they were set back like sunken eyes in tired old faces. All the houses had some kind of porch or covered area so the owners could come outside and still be protected from the sun. But no one was outside just then. No people were in sight. And no black Lincolns. No cars at all.

Soon a street branched off to the right. I slowed and took a good look. Nothing was moving. There was a gap, then a street branched off to the left. Nothing was moving anywhere along it, either. There was a longer gap, and another street to the right. Something blinked red. All the way at the far end. A car’s brake lights going out after the transmission was shifted into Park and the motor was shut off. I made the turn and crept closer. The car was the Lincoln. It was at the curb outside the last house on the right. A truck was stopped halfway along the street, next to a telegraph pole. It was from the telephone company. No one was working nearby so I pulled in behind it. I saw the three guys climb out of the Lincoln. Mansour had been driving. They hurried up the path. His keys were still in his hand. He selected one. The mortise, I guessed. Unlocked the door. Opened it. And they all disappeared inside.

I pulled out, looped around the truck, and stopped behind the Lincoln. The walls of the house it was by were bleached and cracked by the sun. They were painted a deeper shade of orange than its neighbors. It had green window frames. A low roof. It was surrounded by trees. They were short and twisted. There were no buildings beyond it. And none opposite. Just a long stretch of scrubby sand with a scattering of cacti leading up to the border. I took out the gun I’d captured and made my way up the path. The door was made from plain wooden planks. They looked like flotsam washed up on a desert island. The surface was rough. It had been bleached almost white. I tried the handle. It was made out of iron, pitted with age and use. And it was locked. I stood to the side and knocked. The way I used to when I was an MP. When I wasn’t asking to be let in. When I was demanding.

There was no response. I knocked again. Still nothing. I took out the keys I’d found in the Chevy after the guy jumped off the roof at the construction site. Selected the mortise. Stretched out and slid it into the lock.

The key turned easily. I worked the handle and pushed the door. Its hinges were dry. They screeched in protest. No one came running. No one shouted a challenge. No one fired into the gap. I waited for ten seconds, just listening. There was nothing but silence. No footsteps. No creaking floorboards. No breathing. Not even a ticking clock. I stood and stepped through the doorway. My plan was to shoot Mansour on sight. I had no desire to repeat our death match. And I would shoot either of the others if they went for a gun. Then I’d make the final one talk. Or maybe write, if his speech was unintelligible due to his injured jaw. And finally I’d shoot him, too, in the interest of evening the odds.

It was cool in the house. The temperature was maybe fifteen degrees lower than outside. Whoever built the place knew what they were doing. The walls were thick. Made out of some incredibly dense material. The structure could absorb an immense amount of heat. That would make it comfortable in the day. And it would release the heat during the night, making it comfortable then, too.

The place also smelled musty. Of old furniture and possessions. It must have been a weird residual effect because there was nothing in the house. No chairs. No tables. No couches. And there were no people visible, either. The room I had stepped into was large and square. The floor was wooden. It was shiny with age and polish. The walls were smooth and white. The ceiling was all exposed beams and boards. Ahead there was a door. The top half was glass. I could see it led out to a terrace. It was covered, for shade. There was a kitchen to the right. It was basic. A few cupboards, a simple stove, a plain countertop made of wood. There were two windows set into the long wall on the right. They were small. And square. But even so they reminded me of portholes on a ship. There were three doors in the wall to the left. They were all closed. And in the center of the floor there was something strange. A hole.