Ludlum, Robert - The Icarus Agenda

Kendrick opened his eyes to the darkness. Something had awakened him… what was it? The door to his room… Yes, of course, it was the door. Khalehla had told him he was going to be checked and re-checked all night long. Where did she think he would go? Out dancing? He sank back into the pillow, breathing deeply, no strength in him, all energy elusive… No. It was not the door. It was a presence. Someone was there in the room!

Slowly he moved his head, inch by inch on the pillow. There was a blurred splash of white in the dark, no upper or lower extensions, just a dull space of white in the darkness.

'Who is it?' he said, finding his barely audible voice. 'Who's there?'

Silence.

'Who the hell are you? What do you want?

Then, like a rushing onslaught, the white mass came towards him out of the dark and crashed into his face. A pillow. He could not breathe! He swung his right hand up, pushing against a muscular arm, then sliding off the flesh into a face, a soft face, then into the scalp of… woman's hair! He yanked the strands in his grip with all the strength he could summon, rolling to the right on the narrow hospital bed, pulling his predator down to the floor beneath him. He released the hair and hammered the face under him, his shoulder in torment, the stitches broken, blood spreading through the bandages. He tried to yell, but all that emerged was a throated cry. The heavy woman clawed at his neck, her fingers sharp, hard points breaking his skin… then up into his eyes, tearing his lids and scraping his forehead. He surged up, spinning out of her grip, beyond her reach, crashing into the wall. The pain was intolerable. He lurched towards the door but she was on him, hurling him into the side of the bed. His hand struck the carafe of water on the table; he grabbed it and, spinning again, swung it up into the head, into the maniacal face above him. The woman was stunned; he rushed forward throwing his right shoulder into her heavy body, smashing her into the wall, then lunged for the door and yanked it open. The white antiseptic hall was bathed in dim grey light except for a bright lamp behind the desk halfway down the corridor. He tried again to scream.

'Someone…! Help me!' The words were lost; only guttural, muted cries came out of his mouth. He limped, his swollen ankle and damaged leg barely able to support him. Where was everybody? No one was there… no one at the desk! Then two nurses came casually through a door at the far end of the hallway, and he raised his right hand, waving it frantically as the words finally came. 'Help me… !'

'Oh, my God!' screamed one of the women as both rushed forward. Simultaneously, Kendrick heard another set of racing feet. He spun around only to watch helplessly as the heavy, muscular nurse ran out of his room and down the hall to a door beneath a red-lettered Exit sign. She crashed it open and disappeared.

'Call the doctor down in emergency!' cried the nurse who reached him first. 'Hurry. He's bleeding all over the place!'

'Then I'd better call the Rashad girl,' said the second nurse, heading for the desk. 'She's to be called with any change of status, and, Jesus, this is certainly that!'

'No!' yelled Evan, his voice at last a clear, if breathless, roar. 'Leave her alone!'

'But Congressman—'

'Please do as I say. Don't call her! She hasn't slept in two or three days. Just get the doctor and help me back to my room… Then I have to use the phone.'

Forty-five minutes later, his shoulder restitched and his face and neck cleaned up, Kendrick sat in bed, the telephone in his lap, and dialled the number in Washington he had committed to memory. Against strenuous objections he had ordered the doctor and the nurses not to call the military police or even the hospital's security. It had been established that no one on the floor knew the heavyset woman other than as a name, obviously false, through transfer papers presented that afternoon from the base hospital in Pensacola, Florida. Highly qualified nurses were coveted additions to any staff; no one questioned her arrival and no one would stop her in her swift departure. And until the whole picture was clearer, there could be no official investigations triggering news stories in the media. The blackout was still in effect.

'Sorry to wake you, Mitch—’

'Evan?'

'You'd better know what happened.' Kendrick described the all too real nightmare he had lived through, including his decision to avoid the police, civilian and military. 'Maybe I was wrong, but I reckoned once she reached that exit door there wasn't much chance of getting her and every chance of hitting the papers if they tried.'

'You were right,' agreed Payton, speaking rapidly. 'She was a hired gun—'

'Pillow,' corrected Evan.

'Every bit as lethal if you hadn't woken up. The point is, hired killers plan ahead, usually with several different exits and an equal number of changes of clothes. You did the right thing.'

'Who hired her, Mitch?'

'I'd say it's pretty obvious. Grinell did. He's been a malignantly busy man since he got off that island.'

'What do you mean? Khalehla didn't tell me.'

'Khalehla, as you call her, doesn't know. She has enough stress with you on her hands. How is she taking tonight?'

'She hasn't been told. I wouldn't let them call her.'

'She'll be furious.'

'At least she'll get some sleep. What about Grinell?'

'Ardis Vanvlanderen's lawyer is dead and the ledger is nowhere to be found. Grinell's people got to San Jacinto first.'

'Goddamn it!' shouted Kendrick hoarsely. 'We've lost it!'

'It would appear so, but there's something that doesn't quite add up… Do you recall my telling you that all Grinell needed in order to know we were closing in was someone watching the attorney's house?'

'Certainly.'

'Gingerbread found him.'

'And?'

'If they did get that book, why station a lookout after the fact? Indeed, why risk it?'

'Force the lookout to tell you! Drug him up, you've done it before.'

'Gingerbread thinks not.'

'Why not?'

'Two reasons. The man may be a low-scale watchman who knows absolutely nothing, and second, Gingerbread wants to follow him.'

'You mean this Gingerbread found the lookout but the lookout doesn't know it?'

'I told you he was good. Grinell's man doesn't even know we found the dead lawyer. All he saw was a company truck and two gardeners in overalls who proceeded to mow the lawns.'

'But if the lookout's so low-scale, what will Gingerbread—Christ, that's a dumb name—what will he learn by following him?'

'I said he may be low-scale with only a relay telephone number to call periodically that wouldn't tell us anything. On the other hand, he may not be. If he's upscale he could lead us to others.'

'For God's sake, Mitch, drug him and find out!'

'You're not following me, Evan. A relay phone is called periodically … at specific times. If the schedule's broken, we send Grinell the wrong message.'

'You're all convoluted fruitcakes,' said a weakened, exasperated Kendrick.

'It's not much of a living, either… I'll have a couple of Shore Patrols placed at your door. Try to get some rest.'

'What about you? I know you said you couldn't fly out here and now I understand why, but you're still at the office, aren't you?'

'Yes, I'm waiting to hear from Gingerbread. I can work faster from here.'

'You don't want to talk about yesterday morning—about your meeting with the top dog from that Inver Brass?'

'Perhaps tomorrow. It's no longer urgent. Without him there is no Inver Brass.'

'Without him?'

'He killed himself… Merry Christmas, Congressman.'

Khalehla Rashad dropped the packages in her arms and screamed. 'What happened?' she cried, rushing to the bed.

'Medicare's a bunch of bullshit,' replied Evan.