Mickey Spillane - The Killing Man

11

Now the rain was making itself felt. It wasn't a clean rain you could shake loose, but a clinging wetness that smelled of concrete and asphalt. This kind of rain hid things you wanted to know and touched all your nerves with an irritating kind of anxiety.

A Yellow Cab with a lady driver pulled over and I got in, giving her the hospital address. Her eyes bounced up to the rearview mirror. "You want emergency?"

"Right."

"You got it, mister." She hauled out into traffic and got heavy on the gas pedal. She made the first light, got right in the sequence and traveled with the green all the way to the turn. She went through a red signal, cut off a truck and went up the ramp as neatly as any ambulance. I handed her a ten-spot and didn't ask for change.

Sickness and injury never stop in the big city. It was a real bloody night in the emergency room, spatters of red on the walls, trails stringing along the floors, smeared where feet had skidded in its sticky viscosity. The walking wounded were crowded by stretchers and wheelchairs and my shortcut to Velda's floor was blocked.

Rather than try to bust on through I ran down the corridor and followed the arrows to the front elevators. I passed a dozen people, doctors and nurses, but running was common in a hospital and nobody questioned me. It was long after visitors' hours and if you were there at this time, you were authorized to be there.

There were three elevators in the bank and all of them were on the upper floors. I wasn't about to wait, found the stairwell and went up them two at a time. I stopped on the third-floor landing, my breath raw in my lungs. I made myself breathe easily and in thirty seconds a degree of normalcy came back. Wasting myself in a wild run up the stairs wouldn't leave anything left, and that I couldn't take a chance on.

When I reached her floor I pushed through the steel fire door into the corridor and the wave of quiet was a soft kiss of relief. The nurse's desk was to my left, the white tip of the attendant's hat bobbing behind the counter. Someplace a phone rang and was answered. Halfway down the hall a uniformed officer was standing beside a chair, his back against the wall, reading a paper.

The nurse didn't look up, so I went by her. Two of the rooms I passed had their doors open and in the half-lit room I could see forms of the patients, deep in sleep. The next two doors were closed and so was Velda's.

Until I was ten feet away the cop didn't give me a tumble, then he turned and scowled at me. This was a new one on the night shift and he pulled back his sleeve and gave a deliberate look at his wristwatch as if to remind me of the time.

There was no sense making waves when there was no water. I said, "Everything okay?"

For a second the question seemed to confuse him. Then he nodded. "Sure," he replied. "Of course."

All I could do was nod back, like it was stupid of me to ask, and I let him go back to leaning against the wall, his feet crossed comfortably. At the desk I edged around the side until the nurse glanced up. She recognized me and smiled. "Mr. Hammer, good evening."

"How's my doll doing?"

"Just fine, Mr. Hammer. Dr. Reedey was in twice today. Her bandages have been changed and one of the nurses has even helped her with cosmetics."

"Is she moving around?"

"Oh, no. The doctor wants her to have complete bed rest for now. It will be several days before she'll be active at all." She stopped, suddenly realizing the time herself. "Aren't you here a little late?"

"I hope not." Something was bothering me. Something was grating at me and I didn't know what it was. "Nothing out of order on the floor?"

She seemed surprised. "No, everything is quite calm, fortunately."

A small timer on her desk pinged and she looked at her watch. "I'll be back in a few minutes, Mr. Hammer . . ."

Now I knew what the matter was. That cop had looked at his watch too and his was a Rolex Oyster, a big fat expensive watch street cops don't wear on duty. But the real kicker was his shoes. They were regulation black, but they were wing tips. The son of a bitch was a phony, but his rod would be for real and whatever was going down would be just as real.

I said, "How long has that cop been on her door?"

"Oh . . . he came in about fifteen minutes ago."

It was two hours too soon for a shift change.

"Did you see the other one check out?"

"Well, no, but he could have gone . . ."

"They always take these elevators down, don't they?"

She nodded, consternation showing in her eyes. She got the picture all at once and asked calmly, "What shall I do?"

"This a scheduled call you make?"

"I have a patient who needs his medication."

"Where are the other nurses?"

"Madge is on her coffee break. I hold down the fort while she goes."

"All right, you go take care of the patient and stay there. What room is he in?"

"The last one down on the right."

"I'll call when I want you. Give me the phone and you beat it. Don't look back. Do things the way you always do."

She patted her hair in place, went around the counter and stepped on down the hall. She didn't look back. I pulled her call sheet over where I could see it and dialed hospital security. The phone rang eight times and nobody answered. I dialed the operator and she tried. Finally she said, "I'll put their code on, sir. The guards must be making their rounds."

Or they're laid out on their backs someplace.

Overhead, the call bell started to ping out a quiet code every few seconds.

I hung up and dialed Pat's office. He wasn't in either. I remembered his trying to get Ray Wilson and had the operator put me through to Ray's office. This time I got him.

I said, "Pat, I have no time for talk. I'm at the hospital and everything's breaking loose. There's a phony cop at the door, so the real officer is down somewhere. They're going to try to snatch Velda. If they wanted her dead, they would have already done it. Get some cars up here and no sirens. They smell cops and they can kill her."

"They moving now?" Pat got in.

I heard wheels rolling on tile and squinted around the wall. Coming out of the last door down on the right was an empty gurney pushed by a man in orderly's clothes. "They're moving. Shake your ass."

I hung up and stepped out into the corridor, whistling between my teeth. The guy pushing the gurney stopped and started playing with the mattress. I pushed the button on the elevator, looked down at the cop who was watching me too and waved. The phony cop waved back.

When the elevator halted, I got in, let the doors close and pushed the STOP button. I stood there, hoping the guy pushing the gurney wouldn't notice the lights over the doors standing still. The rubber tires thumped a little louder, passed the elevator, and when I didn't hear them any longer, I pushed the MANUAL OPEN button and stood there staring out into the empty corridor. I took my hat off, dropped it on the floor and yanked the .45 out of the holster. There was a shell in the chamber and the hammer was on half cock. I thumbed it back all the way and looked down the corridor.

The guy in the orderly's clothes was standing there with an AK47 automatic rifle cradled in his arms watching both ends of the hallway. His stance was low and when he swung, his coat flopped open and it looked like he was wearing upper-body armor. Half the gurney was sticking out Velda's door and even as I watched, it moved out and I saw her strapped onto the carrier. The man in uniform came out with a police service .38 in one hand and one hell of a big bruiser of an automatic in the other. Unless I got some backup, I was totally outgunned and no way I could close in on them without putting Velda's life on the line.

A quiet little code still pinged from the hall bell. Security still hadn't answered.