Frederick Zackel - Dark Red And Deadly

Hartman was horrified. "Oh my God!"

"She was shot once under the right arm. She raised her arm to defend herself and to protect her baby."

Hartman interrupted her. "The second man got so pissed at his partner getting hit, he went inside the house and wasted anyone and everyone he could find."

Doctor Wu said sadly, "That's how I figured it."

Then Hartman and Doctor Wu went in the children’s bedroom.

Doctor Wu said, "The boy made it to the rear window. Trying to make his escape—"

Hartman was hoarse. "Those miserable stinking lowlife dirty dogs!’

Inside Jeremiah Quint's safe house, which stood on neighboring property, Jimmy Quint broke a window was broken with a rock. Jimmy Quint, who was still grieving and weeping, broke into the safe house and went directly to a floorboard that he ripped up. Under the floorboard were several weapons. Jimmy Quint took up handfuls of ammunition, several automatic pistols and a mini-14 semi-automatic rifle, then left the way he came.

Sheriff Hartman sat with Terry Rafferty at the Quint kitchen table. Special Agent Jack Draper stood behind them by the sink. Sheriff Hartman was reading Rafferty's identification in his wallet.

Hartman said, "What's an investigator from Washington doing here?"

Rafferty said, "I'll tell you in private."

Draper was angry. "Bullshit! He's a buyer from the Mainland."

Repulsed by the DEA agent’s paranoia, Rafferty asked Hartman, "Is he always this hyper?"

Hartman said, "Jeremiah Quint was a grower. You were seen meeting with him last night."

Draper told Rafferty, "You're the only one alive here now."

Rafferty told Hartman, "Call the Senator. He'll vouch for me."

Thoughtfully, Sheriff Hartman left the table and picked up the telephone on the counter.

Nora Buchanan answered the knocking at her back door. She watched as Mad Dog and Lester carried the semiconscious Tomo Oteas inside her apartment. His bloodied shirt was matted against his wound, his eyes were closed and his head rolled around.

Nora was horrified, crushed, agonized. "Tomo!"

Mad Dog said, "Where do you want him, Nora?"

Nora said, "In my bed."

Nora followed them and watched Mad Dog and Lester place Tomo on her bed. She examined him and then discovered how bad his wound was.

"He got shot by raiders," Lester said.

Nora said, "He has to go to County General."

Lester punched Nora in the head. She staggered sideways, nearly fell. He punched her again. This time she hit the floor. Mad Dog stopped him from kicking her in the face.

Mad Dog spoke calmly to Nora. "We'll get you whatever you need, Nora, but he'll get well here in your apartment."

Lester threatened Nora. "Understand, bitch?"

Nora told Mad Dog, "Get him out of my apartment."

Lester tried to punch her again, but Mad Dog stopped him.

Mad Dog said, "That's enough, Lester."

Nora caught on. "Oh god, what did you get Tomo into?"

Mad Dog said, "The Sheriff busted his grandfather's farm, busted all his dope, his grandfather, too, and shot up Tomo here."

Nora was stung. "You crazy—"

Lester went to punch her again. She ducked.

Mad Dog said, "Go wait in the truck, Lester."

Snarling, Lester left the room.

Mad Dog told Nora, "Don't come between me and my son. It won't work."

Helpless against this crazy logic, Nora reexamined Tomo's wounds.

Nora said, "In the bathroom under the sink there's a cardboard box marked with a red cross."

Nora heard a gun cocked. She saw Mad Dog had his gun at her head.

Mad Dog warned her, "I will kill you if you try taking him to the hospital. Understand?"

Nora was desperate. Worse, she was powerless.

Terry Rafferty and Sheriff Hartman sat at a picnic table beneath a flame tree in Quint’s back yard. Rafferty now sported a bandage.

Hartman said, "Where'd you learn to fight like that?"

Rafferty was stone-faced. "I was married to a CIA combat instructor. We divorced, but not before she had taught me more than I wanted to know about hand to-hand combat."

Hartman was cold and disbelieving. "What are you doing here?"

Rafferty lied, saying, "The Senator asked me to look in on one of his former employees, find out if and when he can return to work. He's been staying with his older brother here, and his brother's wife and their kids."

"What's he doing in Hawaii?"

Rafferty admitted, "He had a nervous collapse."

Hartman said, "What's his name?"

"James Sebastian Quint," Rafferty said.

"Where is he right now?"

"I don't know. He was living in a tent by a waterfall in Wild Banana Gulch."

"Do you think James Sebastian Quint could have done this?"

Rafferty was emphatic. "No, Jimmy's the gentlest man I've ever met. Besides, more than one person had a hand in this."

"Why say that?"

"Jeremiah Quint got at least one shot off before somebody else came up and blasted him in the back. There's a fresh bloodstain eight yards away from him."

"Tell me about Jimmy Quint going nuts with a gun in the kitchen."

"How did you know?"

"We got eleven holes in the plaster made by a weapon that wasn't used anywhere else in the house."

Rafferty said, "Jimmy found his family massacred, he was in shock, started jerking the trigger at anything, and it just happened to be me."

"He's a lousy shot," said Hartman.

Rafferty agreed, saying, "Thank God."

Hartman was pensive. "You know, I don't care about dopers killing dopers—in some ways that's the best of all possible worlds—but when they start killing women and children—"

As Special Agent Draper approached, Hartman asked, "Any drugs in the house?"

Draper would not concede defeat. "If there isn't any, that's because the killers got it." He glared at Rafferty.

The Strike Force and Rafferty followed overhead electric wires over a hillside to what looked like an abandoned chicken coop covered with army surplus camouflage netting.

The chicken coop was actually three buildings in one.

In the first part they discovered Jeremiah's research laboratory. The deputies found some bookshelves, chairs and a desk, drug paraphernalia, photo albums, weight scales, records and labels, marijuana manuals, plant food and Jeremiah's seed bank. His seed bank was a tackle box, with each drawer labeled and filled with seeds from all over the world.

Behind his laboratory they found a greenhouse with two-inch starter planters, some mature plants in two-foot plastic pails, and a patch of seven footers in gravel-filled tubs. The coop also held cultivation gear. There were gardening tools, rodent traps, pesticides, camouflage paint, irrigation pipes, and chlordane.

Lastly, the Strike Force found a weapons stash, including Uzis, shotguns, pistols and hand grenades, in the storage space in the rear of the coop.

Hartman, awed, told Rafferty, "He wasn't the biggest grower on the island. Just the best."

Draper approached. "We found his garden."

Sheriff Hartman and Rafferty exchanged looks.

The Strike Force and Rafferty came over a hillside and discovered where Jeremiah Quint's marijuana garden had been. Now there were only the several hundred stumps left behind from harvesting. Everyone wandered aimlessly, until Sheriff Hartman gestured to his men to fan out and looked around. Deputies went off in all directions

Jimmy Quint squatted in the bushes, fiddling with his brother's semi-automatic rifle, when three prowling deputies came face to-face with him. Startled, Jimmy fired his rifle at their direction. The deputies hit the dust, drawing their weapons, while Jimmy took off running.