Firebreak

13

Barker, watching the Blazer appear on the downhill monitors, said, "I'm sorry I had to leave the Remington."

Wiss was out positioning the ambulance, while Elkins and Parker watched the monitors. Elkins looked away from the screens to study Parker's profile. "Why?"

Parker nodded at the Blazer just as it ran beyond the range of the downhill monitors. "If they grab him, and they might, what does he say about you and me? He has a history, he talks with prosecutors. If I had the Remington, I'd drop him when they drive him down past here. Whatever Ralph thinks."

The Blazer appeared on the exterior house monitors, coming up. Uniformed cops, four of them, carried one crate at a time out of the lodge and up the ramp and into the back of the tall slat-sided canvas-covered truck with the state police logo on both doors. The driver, smoking a cigarette, wandered around the front of the building, curious, looking the place over. Inside, in various rooms, uniformed and plainclothes cops conducted a detailed search, a fishing expedition they could play at because the place was already a crime scene.

Elkins said, "Ralph won't argue. We all know Larry; he's okay, but he gets too emotional."

Moxon had established himself in the office near the front door. Parker watched him look out the window, see the Blazer coming, and get to his feet. He walked out of the lodge as the four cops were coming in for another crate.

Moxon stepped down off the porch, and Lloyd got smiling out of the Blazer, walking forward to meet Moxon, hand held out, mouth already moving. Moxon seemed a little confused, but not suspicious, and accepted the handshake.

Elkins said, "He's making it work."

Moxon and Lloyd stood together, near the left side of the truck, talking, Lloyd making gestures down the hill, explaining himself.

'The reason he can do a civilian so good," Elkins said, "is because he is a civilian."

On the screens, Moxon made a right-arm gesture that clearly invited Lloyd into the lodge, come on in, sit in the office, let's figure out who you are and what you're doing here. Lloyd, smiling, eager, did his own gesture: you first. Moxon turned toward the house, and Lloyd jumped into the truck as the four cops were coming out again, toting another crate.

"God damn!" Elkins said.

Moxon turned, yelling, jumping toward the truck, but Lloyd already had it rolling. It faced downhill, so all he had to do was put it in neutral to get it to move.

They watched Moxon run beside the truck, shouting, almost reaching the door handle, but then the truck jerked forward as Lloyd got the engine started, and a second later it leaped away, leaving Moxon behind.

"Son of a bitch did it," Elkins said.

Moxon turned to yell toward the house. The four cops had dropped the crate and were running for the nearby parked police cars. The truck ran away downhill from the house and its monitors, disappearing as the cops, in two police cars, raced after it.

Parker hit the switches Lloyd had marked to cut the lodge's power and phone. "Jam it," he said, and Elkins hurried out of the room toward the jammer Lloyd had made.

Parker watched the truck, not fast, appear in the downhill monitors. Already the two police cars were closing with it. He left the security room, found Elkins coming in the hall outside, and said, "Come on. It's going bad."

They trotted from the house, Elkins saying, "What's up?"

"The truck's too slow, there won't be a gap where we could block the road."

Wiss was in the ambulance, motor running. They had it sideways on the road, blocking the uphill lane, its rear in the middle of the road. The passenger side faced downhill, two tall green oxygen canisters angled out the open passenger window.

Parker shouted to Wiss, "Come out! Leave the engine on!"

Wiss clambered out of the ambulance and met Parker and Elkins in front of it, saying, "What's wrong?"

'Truck too slow," Parker told him, "cops right on his tail. You two get down to the next curve, flag Lloyd down, I'll get there."

He went around to get into the ambulance, as the other two trotted away. He was positioned at the downhill end of a tight curve, flanked by thick evergreens. The truck would be almost on him before anybody saw anybody.

He heard sirens, getting louder. Why did they bother with sirens? But it told him they were close. He shifted into reverse.

The truck swerved around the curve, rocking from side to side, motor loudly straining, going as fast as it could, which wasn't fast enough. Lloyd, a pale shape behind the windshield, bounced like a puppet inside there, twisting the wheel back and forth. The police cars, in a row, streamed right behind him.

The truck roared by the ambulance and Parker stamped hard on the accelerator. The ambulance surged backward, ramming the first police car just behind its left front wheel, bouncing it off the road. The second police car, swerving away from the ambulance that now blocked the entire road, ran into a tree on the other side.

Parker shifted into drive, and the ambulance jounced forward, accelerating around the next curve, finding the truck stopped there, just off the road. He pounded the brake pedal, skewed to a sideways stop, reaching to spin both oxygen canister valves open, then jumped out of the ambulance and ran for the truck.

They were already firing at the oxygen when he got there. It took half a dozen shots before a ricochet caused the spark they needed. Then the explosion pinned them against the side of the truck, threw heat at them and then wind, and then cold.

The ambulance was a mass of debris now, spread across the road. Trees to both sides had caught fire.