Warren Murphy: Firing Line

He came back, his face drained of color.

"The worst?" the mayor said.

"Yeah," said the aide. "We were too late. The police said the Marine Terminal's rubble. It went up like a match, and the flames were so hot, it's like the stones almost melted. Five, maybe six, dead inside."

"Give in," said the commissioner. "Give in. Settle."

"Get out of here," the mayor said. "You make me

sick."

As the night wore on toward midnight, fires were blossoming all over the city, and as Remo and Chiun's plane angled in toward John F. Kennedy Au-port, they could seem the sky glowing over the city.

In a rented car, driving into Manhattan, Remo listened to the news bulletins on the radio:

151

• The National Guard was moving in, the governor authorizing it after finally having been located at the opening of a new Beautiful People disco.

• The mayor was asking the public to mobilize and help fight the fires in the city. "I know they will respond," he said.

• The press did not know why, but the twin towers of the World Trade Center had been sealed off by agency police. All train service into the building had been stopped, and no one was being allowed into the area housing the mammoth structures.

"What do we do now?" Chiun asked.

"The mayors at City Hall," Remo said. "We're going there. It looks like the World Trade Center is on Sparky's hit list"

152

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The kid had flipped. Solly Martin knew it when he had to drag the young boy out of the blazing East Side Marine Terminal. The building was falling around him; there were the screams of the burning and dying, and Sparky McGurl had wanted to stay there and wait for the cops to arrive so he could incinerate them, too. When Solly had dragged him back to the car, the kid's eyes were flashing with excitement. The excitement of death. Martin drove instantly downtown, then through the Holland Tunnel from New York into Jersey City. They made a left hand turn near the Holiday Inn, then headed south toward the decaying heart of the old city.

At burned-out City Hall, they made another left-hand turn and drove back toward the water, toward the Hudson River and the New York skyline. Exchange Place, busy during the day with the work of responsible stock firms and a handful of boiler rooms that specialized in selling worthless stock over the telephone to people who shouldn't even have been allowed to have a telephone, was dark and empty. They parked their car against a wooden timber that acted as a retaining wall to

154

prevent cars from rolling into the murky waters of the Hudson, here so decayed and volatile that they could have peeled off a car's paint before it touched the mud of the shallow bottom.

"What are we doing here?" Sparky asked. His voice was annoyed and demanding.

"Leave it to me," Solly said. He took a flashlight and a screwdriver from under the front seat, jammed them into his belt, then both left their car.

A wooden kiosk marked the entrance to the Port Authority Trans-Hudson subway, which went under the river from his spot in New Jersey to New York. The subway station, in keeping with the Port Authority's commitment to equality for New Jersey, was possibly the dirtiest and ugliest in the United States. Going down into it gave the impression of entering a coal mine.

The kiosk door was locked. A sign posted read:

ALL TRAIN SERVICE CANCELLED.

TRAINS TO NEWARK AT JOURNAL SQUARE.

Solly peered in through the dirt-crusted window. The building was dark. The old metal and wood door pulled open easily after Solly stuck the screwdriver into the lock. They both stepped into the darkness.

They stopped to listen, and when they heard no sound, Solly flipped on his flashlight for a brief instant. He saw the steps leading down at the end of the long entrance hallway.

"Follow me," he whispered. "And be quiet."

They walked down three flights of steps, pausing at every landing to listen, and then they were in another long hallway. At the end of it, Solly saw the turnstiles marking the entrance to the tubes. The Port Authority indicated its priorities by hav-

155

ing kept the turnstiles still working, the faint red glow from their automatic coin-demanders creating an eerie halo around the entranceway. Solly and the boy slid under the turnstile, and Solly again flipped on his light. He saw a sign that read: wtc— world trade center—and they turned right, down another flight of stairs. They were on a subway platform. They paused, listening.

When he was sure the platform was empty, Solly led the youth to the edge of the platform. He flashed his light, as they jumped down onto the wooden timbers that transversed the tracks. They began to walk to the left.

Solly leaned over to the boy. "Next stop, World Trade Center," he said. The boy giggled as they walked off in the dark into the tunnel that led under the Hudson River to the twin towers in New York.

A New York City police squad of two captains, three lieutenants, and four sergeants, all supervising one patrolman, stood guard outside the crisis control center in the City Hall building.

The patrolman stood at the door. The nine superior officers sat in chairs, watching him carefully for even the smallest hint of inefficiency or insubordination.

The patrolman stopped Remo and Chiun when they appeared at the door. Remo showed his FBI identification.

The patrolman looked at it, then called toward the group of sergeants.

"Sir?"

The sergeant with the least seniority came over.

"Yes, patrolman?"

156

"This man's from the FBI. Here's his identification."

The sergeant fondled it. He nodded several times, then took it back to the other sergeants. He showed it to the sergeant with the next most seniority, who fondled the ID, nodded, and passed it on to the senior sergeant. The three sergeants huddled. They took turns fondling the ID card. Finally, the lowest-seniority sergeant carried the card to the lieutenant with the least seniority.

"Hey," Remo called. "Is this almost a wrap?"

"Procedures," the ranking sergeant called. 'They have to be followed."

The lieutenants were now in heated discussion, apparently deciding who was going to take the FBI card to the two captains for evaluation.

Remo walked over to the three lieutenants and took the card back. He motioned for the four sergeants to join him. He motioned for the two captains to come over. When all nine had assembled, he held up the card.

'This is an FBI card. It belongs to me. The Oriental gentleman is with me. We are on government business. We are going inside."

"Do you have approval?" one of the captains said.

"I do now," Remo said. He put the card back into his shirt pocket. His hands flashed in the air. Later, the patrolman would say that he hadn't seen anything, but suddenly all nine officers were holding their faces. Their noses hurt.

'That's just a touch," Remo said. "You understand. Now I've got approval, right?"

"Right," said nine voices.

Thank you."

157

Remo went back to Chiun. The patrolman moved aside.

"We've got approval," Remo said.

The patrolman winked.

Inside the room, the mayor sat with his head resting on his hands, as if trying to wring a headache out of it.

"Another string of fires, up along York Avenue," his aide called to him.

The mayor shook his head. "Call the firemen. Tell them to go back to work."

The aide said, "You can't do that. It'll kill you politically."

"And if I don't, there are going to be bodies stacked up all over this city," the mayor said. "Tell them they can have deer season off. They can have duck season. They can have frigging mongoose season. I'm gonna get their asses later, but they've got to go back."

The aide started to protest, but the mayor barked, "Do it." Then he looked up and saw Remo.