Firebreak

9

Bob was trying to move, trying to breathe, trying to live. Wiss stopped the drill to gape at the arrow Bob was feebly fumbling at. Parker, dropping the bow and crossing the main room in long' strides, pointed at Wiss, at the drill, made spinning motions with that hand. Wiss blinked, and pulled the trigger, and drilled air.

Parker reached Bob, looked up at the empty doorway at the top of the stairs, and still looking there closed his left hand on Bob's windpipe, squeezing in from both sides. Bob, in shock, bleeding inside, tried to fight away from him, but Parker leaned his weight on that hand, pressing the throat and head harder against the side wall, until the struggle lessened, then stopped.

Parker held for another long minute, then reached down to take the Colt out of Bob's lap. The blood that had started to seep from his mouth had stopped now, because the heart wasn't beating.

While the drill whirred in Wiss's hand behind him, Parker went slowly up the stairs. At the top, he waited, chest down on the stair edges, listening. What he could see was a trapezoid of hallway, pale green wall, part of a hunting scene genre painting, part of a many-bulbed golden chandelier.

Which way was the other one? If he committed to look to the left, and Harry was to the right, he'd be rewarded with a bullet in the head. He listened, the drill-whine only a faint burr behind him now, hoping to hear Harry breathe, or move, or yawn.

Nothing. How far away was he?

Fifty-fifty odds were not acceptable. Holding the Colt in his right hand, he reached into his left pants pocket. The only coin he ever carried while working was one quarter, in case he found himself in a place where he needed a phone. Now he took the quarter out and flipped it high and arcing across the hallway to flash glittering in the chandelier light, clink against the far wall, bounce silently on the carpeted floor.

A quick rustle; to the right; Parker launched himself out of the stairwell, diving as though into a swimming pool, right arm extended to the right, firing the Colt before he could see, landing flat on his chest, head to the right, sighting along his extended arm now at the bulky figure shooting, the gnats whizzing just above his head, firing the Colt, squeezing it off, squeezing it off, the figure bouncing back, half-turning, suddenly running away down the hall, Parker sending the rest of the Colt's clip after him, but the stance too awkward down here, no good at the increasing distance, Harry to the end of the hallway and through the door there and out of sight.

Feet under him, Colt tossed away, Parker called down, "Come up!" and ran down the hall as he pulled his own .38 revolver out of his coat pocket.

He could hear Wiss and Elkins behind him, but couldn't see Harry ahead. He had to slow at the doorway, hesitate, come in fast and low, see no one in the long dining room, the table like a bowling alley lane, the high-backed wooden chairs, the wall of mirrors under the chandeliers reflecting him back as he pursued down the long room and out the far end.

Every doorway was a delay, but every room he went into was empty, and at the end the rear door was open, the door he and the others had first come in. Parker raced through that doorway, out to the cold bright sunless northern day, and the bulky figure was getting into the Cherokee, their car that they'd left up above, that Elkins and the other two had driven down.

They needed that car. Parker fired, shattering the driver's window as Harry ducked, starting the engine, the Jeep jerking forward.

Parker fired again, but there was too little to shoot at. He didn't want to put out tires, hit the gas tank. The only target he was interested in was the man, but the man was too encased in the thick frame of the

Cherokee, and now it was moving away, cutting across the frozen lawn to turn back north.

Wiss and Elkins came panting out of the house, both with their guns in their hands. Wiss said, "What do we—" and they all heard the siren.

Sirens. They all faded back into the house, and two state police cars, red lights whirling on their roofs, ran upward from the side of the house, sirens screaming as they chased the Cherokee.

The three in the entry room looked at one another. Elkins said, "I'd say, we lost our ride."