Стивен Хантер - G-Man

“What was that?”

“One of the cops. It’s nothing.”

“Is that sonovabitch coming?” J.P. said.

“I don’t see lights. He must have stopped to help the cops.”

“Jesus Christ, who was he?”

“I don’t know, but that guy could shoot. You see how close he came? One more and I’m whacked cold at a hundred fifty yards by the Lone Ranger.”

“Sonovabitch!” said J.P.

“You okay, Helen?”

“Just scared.”

“It’s okay. No damage.”

“I’m so scared, Les.”

“It’s okay, baby,” he said, and reached over the seat. Her hand came into his, and both squeezed to feel the firmness of flesh and to commemorate the joy of survival.

But Les’s mind was elsewhere.

Man, that guy had some balls.

Charles drove down the road to the cruiser, where the one officer had gotten out of the ditch and now leaned into his vehicle and was working on his more severely hit partner.

“You okay, Officer?” Charles asked.

“I’m not hit bad,” said the cop, not looking up. “Fred’s shot up pretty bad, though. Man, what kind of gun was that?”

“Some kind of jazzed-up pistol. You got radio?”

“No. Maybe we could pull him over a little, and I’ll take off for the nearest hospital.”

“That’s a good idea. I’ll follow to make sure.”

The two men eased the slumped Fred over into the other seat, finding him sodden with his own fluid but breathing and conscious.

“Jesus,” he said, “I hurt everywhere.”

“Fred, I don’t see anything bleeding hard or spurting. I think he missed your arteries.”

“Just get me to the hospital.”

“Next stop,” he said, getting Fred set up for the drive.

He pulled back.

“You sure you’re okay to drive?” asked Charles.

“I’m fine, nothing seriously damaged. Say, who are you? Where’d you learn to shoot like that? You sure saved our asses. He was coming ’round to finish us.”

Charles turned his lapel to show his badge.

“Justice Department, Division of Investigation.”

“Man, you must be made of guts, the way you stood there while that sonovabitch unloaded on you.”

“Too stupid to know better, too old to care much,” said Charles.

The cop got behind the wheel and gunned the car through a tight U-turn and lit out up the road. Charles duplicated the turn and followed.

It took a while for the scene to develop at the hospital. First it was just Charles sitting in the lobby, smoking, berating himself silently for wrong decisions. If he’d had that Thompson, he might have been able to bring down the shooter and take the others. With a couple of the better kids along, law school or not, the advantage would have been with them.

On the other hand, he knew if the shooter had had a Thompson, he would have been able to bring down Charles.

Charles also realized it had to be Nelson, with that small-scale machine pistol. Its short barrel and powerful kick made it hard to shoot well at anything except within contact distance. It had to be the gun he used on Carter Baum because the surviving witnesses had remarked on the excessive flash, which was the signature of the weapon. But he also decided to keep that fact from everybody until he’d cleared it with Division. It was a nice piece of intelligence, and he might need it, because he knew he could be harshly judged for his mistakes tonight.

Calming himself with the ritual of assembling the makings, he lit another cigarette. Meanwhile, two, then three, then six more State Troopers arrived, then an older fellow in a raincoat over a bathrobe to whom all deferred and Charles presumed was the superintendent or commanding officer.

Several of the State boys came over to shake Charles’s hand and tell him how much they appreciated his work. People kept arriving, in hastily thrown-on civilian clothes, perhaps other executives, detectives, maybe the dedicated State Police surgeon, Mount Prospect patrolmen and supervisors, someone from the State Attorney’s Office, and soon the waiting room was jammed, and outside more and more cars were cramming into the parking lot.

After a bit, the disheveled older man came over.

“I’m Claude Bevens, Superintendent of the Illinois State Police,” he said, extending a hand.

Charles rose to shake it.

“Swagger, Justice Department. Are your officers all right?”

“Both will survive, I’m told. Cross was only nicked; he’ll be back on duty in a week. Fred McAllister was all shot up, hit six times. But because he was low in the car and didn’t catch one in head or throat, they think he’ll be okay too, in time.”

“Glad to hear that.”

“My boys say you saved their lives. Say you shot it out with whoever that bastard was and damned near clipped him. You didn’t duck, flinch, drop, move, or anything, all those bullets from that crazy little gun bouncing all around you. I don’t know what stuff you’re made of, Special Agent, but I wish I had a little of the same.”

“Sir, I was in the war. I’ve been shot at before. A lot.”

“Most men run and hide.”

“Didn’t think about it. Too busy trying to drop that fellow.”

“Well, our detectives would like to take a deposition. I know you want to get back downtown and write this up for Mr. Purvis. Can you give us a few more minutes?”

“Sure.”

“I’m going to schedule a press conference for four p.m. today. Maybe you could be there for that? I’d like to get Mr. Purvis out here for it too. You deserve recognition for what you did. He should know, you should get some kind of medal.”

“Sir, if you could do me a favor, it would be to leave my name out of it. Our Director is very particular about individual agents getting special credit. Between you and me, he’s a little fed up with Purvis for getting so big in the papers, and the rumors say Purvis’s position is shaky. I’d be happy to talk to your detectives, and feel free to communicate with Purvis or Mr. Cowley, but putting me behind microphones in front of cameras won’t do me no good at all.”

“You sure? These are times when we all need heroes to believe in.”

“It’s my best move.”

“Okay, Justice. It’s your call.”

BLUE EYE, ARKANSAS

The present

“Nothing,” he said to Jen over the phone from his hotel room. “I am out of leads and real low on hope.”

“Well,” she said, “you are not known as a quitter, so I know you’ll break this one open just like you did with that Russian woman sniper.”

“But I had leads with Mily Petrova. Plus, I liked Mily. This old man’s an undertaker with an attitude. What’s his problem, anyhow? He won’t let anybody near.”

“He doesn’t care for fools. Sound familiar?”

“The old buzzard left nothing behind him, and there’s nothing in the records. The hints are all circumstantial, and while they suggest, you couldn’t go to the bank with ’em.”

“I know that—”

“Well, wait,” he said. “To be fair, the Historical Society let me go through the photos again, and I did fetch one from December of 1934, when he was back on the job, and no mention had been made of his five-month absence. Silly picture, ‘Sheriff Swagger awards the 1934 Crossing Guard of the Year with a gold plaque.’ Small-town-newspaper stuff not important to anyone except the little girl who was in the picture. So—”

He paused. Time passed, the universe began to move again.

“There you go,” she said.

“She’d be ninety-four, if she was still alive. The chances are small that her mind is clear. And even smaller still that she’d remember having her picture taken with a sheriff in early December eighty-three years ago.”