Michael Connelly - The Scarecrow

I shifted to my left and leaned in closer to the window so I could get a wider view of the roof. Courier could be out there.

Just as I did this, I saw a blurred reflection of movement in the glass.

Someone was behind me.

Instinctively, I jumped sideways and turned at the same time. Courier’s arm swung down with a knife and barely missed me as he crashed into the door.

I planted my feet and then drove my body into his, bringing my arm up and stabbing my own blade into his side.

But my weapon was too short. I scored a direct hit but didn’t do enough damage to bring down the target. Courier yelped and brought his forearm down on my wrist, knocking my blade to the floor. He then took an enraged, roundhouse swing at me with his own. I managed to duck underneath it but got a good look at his blade. It was at least four inches long and I knew if he connected with it, it would be a one-and-done proposition for me.

Courier made another jab and this time I parried to the right and caught his wrist. The only advantage I had was my size. I was older and slower than Courier, but I had forty pounds on him. While holding his knife hand away, I threw my body into him again, knocking him back through the forest of stand-up lamps and onto the concrete floor.

He broke free during the fall and then scrabbled to his feet with the knife ready. I grabbed one of the lamps, holding its round base out and ready to spar at him and deflect the next assault.

For a moment nothing happened. He held the knife at the ready and we seemed to be taking each other’s measure, waiting for the other to make the next move. I then made a charge with the lamp base but he sidestepped it easily. We then squared off again. He had a desperate sort of smile on his face and was breathing heavily.

“Where are you going to go, Courier? You hear all those sirens? They’re here, man. There’s going to be cops and FBI all over this place in two minutes. Where’re you going to go then?”

He didn’t say anything and I took another poke at him with the lamp. He grabbed the base and we momentarily struggled for control of it, but I pushed him back into a stack of mini-refrigerators and they crashed to the floor.

I had no experience in the area of knife fighting, but my instincts told me to keep talking. If I distracted Courier, then I would lessen the threat from the knife and possibly get an open shot at him. So I kept throwing the questions at him, waiting for my moment.

“Where’s your partner? Where’s McGinnis? What did he do, send you to do the dirty work by yourself? Just like Nevada, huh? You missed your chance again.”

Courier grinned at me but didn’t take the bait.

“Does he just tell you what to do? Like your mentor on murder or something? Man, the master’s not going to be very happy with you tonight. You’re oh for two, man.”

This time he couldn’t control it.

“McGinnis is dead, you dumb fuck! I buried him in the desert. Just like I was going to bury your bitch after I was through with her.”

I feigned another jab at him with the lamp and tried to keep him talking.

“I don’t get it, Courier. If he’s dead, why didn’t you just run? Why risk everything to go for her?”

At the same moment he opened his mouth to reply, I faked a jab at his chest with the lamp and then brought the base up into his face, catching him flush on the jaw. Courier staggered backward momentarily and I quickly moved in, hurling the lamp at him first and then going for the knife with both hands. We smashed into a television cabinet and fell to the floor, me on top of him and grappling for control of the knife.

He shifted his weight beneath me and we rolled three times, with him ending up on top. I kept both hands on his wrist and he pushed his free hand into my face, trying to break my grip by stiff-arming me away. I finally managed to bend his wrist at a painful angle. He cried out and the knife came free and clattered to the concrete. With an elbow I shoved it toward the stairwell shaft but it stopped just shy of the mark, balancing on the edge below the blue guardrail. It was six feet away.

I went after him like an animal then, punching and kicking and fueled by a primal rage I had never felt before. I grabbed an ear and tried to rip it off. I swung an elbow into his teeth. But the energy of youth gradually gave him the upper hand. I was tiring quickly and he managed to pull back and get distance. He then brought a knee up into my crotch and the air exploded out of my lungs. Paralyzing pain shot through me and weakened my hold. He broke completely free and got up to go for the knife.

Calling on my last reserve of strength, I half crawled, half lunged after him as I struggled to my feet. I was hurt and spent but I knew that if he got to the knife, I would be dead.

I threw my weight into him from behind. He lurched forward into the railing, his upper body pivoting over it. Without thinking, I reached down, grabbed one of his legs and flipped him all the way over the rail. He tried to grab the steel piping but his grip slipped and he fell.

His scream lasted only two seconds. His head hit either a railing or the concrete siding of the shaft, and after that, he fell silently, his body caroming from side to side on its way down thirteen floors.

I watched him all the way. Until the final, loud impact echoed all the way back up to me.

I wish I could say I felt guilt or even a sense of remorse. But I felt like cheering every moment of his fall.

The next morning I went back to Los Angeles for real, leaning against the plane’s window and sleeping the whole way. I had spent most of the night in the now familiar surroundings of the FBI. Agent Bantam and I faced off again in the mobile interview room for several hours, during which I told and retold the story of what I had done the evening before and how Courier came to fall thirteen floors to his death. I told him what Courier had said about McGinnis and the desert and the plan for Rachel Walling.

During the interview Bantam never dropped the mask of detached federal agent. He never said thank you for saving the life of his fellow agent. He just asked questions, sometimes five or six different times and ways. And when it was finally over, he informed me that the details regarding the death of Marc Courier would be submitted to a state grand jury to determine if a crime had been committed or if my actions constituted self-defense. It was only then that he broke the mold and spoke to me like a human being.

“I have mixed feelings about you, McEvoy. You no doubt saved Agent Walling’s life but going up there after Courier was the wrong move. You should have waited. If you had, he might be alive right now and we might have some of the answers. As it is, if McGinnis is really dead, most of the secrets went down that shaft with Courier. It’s a big desert out there, if you know what I mean.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sorry about that, Agent Bantam. I kind of look at it like if I hadn’t gone after him, he might have gotten away. And if that had happened, the chances are, you wouldn’t get any answers either. You’d just get more bodies.”

“Maybe. But we’ll never know.”

“So what happens now?”

“Like I said, we’ll present it to the grand jury. I doubt you’ll have any problems. The world’s not exactly going to feel sorry for Marc Courier.”

“I don’t mean with me. I’m not worried about that. With the investigation, what happens now?”

He paused as if to consider whether he should tell me anything.

“We’ll try to re-create the trail. That’s all we can do. We’re not done at Western Data. We’ll continue there and we’ll try to put together a picture of what these men did. And we’ll keep looking for McGinnis. Dead or alive. We only have Courier’s word that he’s dead. Personally, I’m not sure I believe it.”