Michael Slade - Headhunter

As he came through the door, Spann was sitting on the floorboards with four voodoo masks at her feet. He saw she had found two planks nailed together that swiveled on a hinge. The small door now stood open revealing a hole in the floor. Katherine Spann had pried one mask apart and powder had spilled in her lap. As he watched she wet her index finger and dipped it into the mess, then she raised her hand to her lips and touched the end of her tongue.

"Is it coke?" Scarlett asked.

"Eureka," she said. "The tip of my tongue's frozen solid."

"How much is in the mask?"

"At least eight ounces."

"We're five away." It was Tipple's voice. "You better make it snappy."

"You keep going here. I'll keep going out front." Quickly Scarlett rushed back out the door and began to tap the floor. And then he saw the blood. There was one small drop of it off to his right. Reaching out he touched it and found that it was fresh.

"We're three away. Maybe less. Hardy's driving fast."

Scarlett rapidly tapped the floor around the drop of blood in an ever-widening circle. He pushed at each and every join of the boards. He still had the crowbar so he began to poke and pry. Then two of the floorboards gave.

"Rick, I can see the place. I'm going to have to drop back cause Hardy's pulling up outside."

"Kathy!" Scarlett whispered sharply. "Get in here quick!"

As he turned the volume of the radio down, she came up beside him crawling on hands and knees. "Look," he said, and swiveled open the boards. They both heard the car pull up outside. Both had killed their lights.

Reaching into the hole in the floor Rick Scarlett could feel two plastic bags hanging from nails in the underside of the planks. The shack was built up on stilts because of the mountain runoff. Both bags would have been hanging above the ground but, as the supports were boarded around, well hidden from sight.

Scarlett removed the first of the bags and tossed it quickly to Spann. At that moment beyond the window there was a flash of firelight. Footsteps approached the front door.

Katherine Spann reached inside and removed four half-pound plastic bags of cocaine.

A key slipped into the lock of the front door. Orange light danced at the window.

Scarlett pulled out the second bag and reached for his gun. The.38 just cleared leather as Hardy opened the door.

"Freeze!" Scarlett ordered. "We're the police!"

In shock the man in the doorway stopped in his tracks. He held a coal-oil lamp out in his right hand, the light of the flame that licked within the glass chimney cavorting about the blank walls of the room.

Hardy looked at the.38 in Rick Scarlett's hand.

He glanced at Katherine Spann and his eyes took in the bags of cocaine.

"So you found the blow," he said.

"We found more than that," Scarlett replied. "Now put down the lamp. Easy. On the floor."

Hardy followed the order. Then as he was straightening up Scarlett put his gun on the floor, reached into the second bag, and from it removed a bowie knife and a Polaroid camera wrapped in another plastic bag. The knife was a foot long with a shallow crescent dipping from the back of the blade down to form a point. Except for a tiny nick in the steel, the cutting edge was honed sharp.

Hardy shook his head. "I never seen them things before," he said, looking straight at Scarlett.

"Then how 'bout this," the cop said. And he reached back into the bag and by the hair pulled out a human head.

"Jesus!" Hardy exclaimed.

His mouth dropped open and with a wild panic his eyes flicked from the head to the hole in the floor, from Rick Scarlett to Katherine Spann. Then he savagely kicked the lamp.

Spinning and spewing its oil, which became a pinwheel of squirting flame, the lamp flew across the room in Rick Scarlett's direction. With a scream the man covered his face and the severed head dropped to the floor. It rolled toward Katherine Spann who was trying to draw her gun.

With a whoosh the floor ignited along with Scarlett's arm. "I'm on fire!" the cop screamed, madly beating his flaming arm against his chest trying to fan out the blaze. At last in desperation he threw himself on to the floor, landing on top of both his gun and his arm where the floorboards had yet to ignite. His body smothered the fire.

Hardy lunged for the bowie knife now lying on the floor. Clutching it in one hand he took a swipe at Spann. Throwing herself away from him, the woman went sprawling back on the floorboards. With a crack she hit her head.

Scarlett was scrambling to his feet when Hardy swung again. This time the knife connected, slashing through the uniform and opening the flesh of the policeman's arm from the elbow to the wrist. Scarlett went down on his knees and Hardy was upon him.

"Don't!" Tipple yelled from the door, reaching for his gun but knowing he wouldn't make it in time.

With a full-arm slash, John Lincoln Hardy went for Rick Scarlett's throat just as Katherine Spann fired. She was now up on her knees. Her gun was in both hands.

The explosion was shocking within the small confines of the room.

As the muzzle flashed, the first bullet struck Hardy's neck, blowing out an exit wound the size of a golfball. The force of the slug sent him spinning and the knife slash missed by inches. Then Katherine Spann fired again and Hardy's head erupted. The lead took him just behind the left ear, ripping through his brain to blow out the front of his forehead in a shower of blood and gristle and bone. A third shot from the.38 hit him in the spine. His body crashed to the floor.

"Rick, grab the light stuff and get outside," Tipple ordered, as he came leaping through the flames. "Spann, get that head and the drugs and get the knife from that man. I'll take the body."

One minute later they were all outside as the fire consumed the cabin. Like a beacon, those flames on the mountainside could be seen for miles. Twenty minutes later the skies opened up and poured down to extinguish the embers.

In this city, it often rains.

10:39 p.m.

Robert DeClercq had both cleaned and oiled his gun, then set it down on the desk in the greenhouse. Over the past hour and a half he had tidied up all the Headhunter files, taking them out and stacking them beside the front door entrance. That completed, he had written a long note to Commissioner Francois Chartrand outlining a few final thoughts on the course of the investigation, developing further one or two theories before he had signed off the letter by wishing the man good luck. He had written a note to Genevieve and tacked it to the greenhouse door.

The greenhouse was attached to the wall that made up the south side of the building. Though there were windows in the left half of the wall looking over the ocean, the right half that abutted the greenhouse was solid wood planking. A large oak door gave access, but other than that there was no other way to look into the glass outbuilding.

In the note to his wife Robert DeClercq had asked her to try and forgive him. He did not explain his actions, for she would understand. He simply said that he loved her, that he considered her the most unselfish individual that he had ever met, and he thanked her for the joy of their time together.

"I've gone to find Janie," he said in closing, "so please don't open the door. Just call the police and know that I have escaped from my dungeon."

As a final act of preparation, Robert DeClercq had brushed down his blue serge uniform and hung it on a hanger beside the files at the door. He had crossed to the liquor cabinet and consumed two swallows of brandy straight. Then picking up Janie's picture he had gone into the greenhouse.

He was just locking the door when he heard the noise that made him stop.