Shadow of a Broken Man

22

The tires of Tal's car squealed as we gathered speed in the underground garage. He was doing close to thirty by the time we hit the street. As we sped down Second Avenue, I hung on and listened to the sirens in the distance ahead of us. Garth was on his way, with company.

"I think this could be a trick," Malakov said. The Ambassador's face was ashen, and he was hanging on to a leather passenger loop with both hands. "The American agent will get there before we do."

The Ambassador had a point. Lippitt had a good half- hour start, and there was no way Tal could drive fast enough to make up the difference. It bothered me.

"Lippitt's not going to like our showing up," I said to Tal. "We could both end up in the slammer for the next two hundred years."

"Well, we'll just have to worry about that when the time comes," Tal said. He came up on a lumbering soda truck and veered effortlessly around it while I fought off the impulse to grab the wheel. Malakov gasped. "The important thing is that Rafferty's proposal is reasonable," Tal continued easily. "He'll be highly visible at all times. Whatever he wants to do, he'll be seen doing it, and that's the all-important thing. If anyone wishes to talk with him, fine; people with secrets will know enough to stay away."

"There'll be emotional problems for the Fosters," I said.

"They'll be all right. Certainly, Rafferty will make no demands on her." After a pause he added, "He may have loved her much more than Mrs. Foster realizes."

"Uh-huh. And he was legally dead as far as the law is concerned when the Fosters were married."

In twenty minutes we reached Rockaway Boulevard. Tal turned left and we sped down the broad highway. I thought I could hear the deadly rattle of automatic-weapons fire ahead. Tal heard it too, jammed the accelerator to the floor, cursed softly and systematically. The Ambassador leaned forward anxiously. We were speeding along a section of the highway bounded by rocky cliffs on one side and, on the other, dirty, rock-strewn stretches of muddied sand sloping down to the sea. The air smelled of rotting fish.

Tal went into a power slide, straightened out, and fish- tailed fifty yards down the rutted remains of a road leading toward a collection of police cars and men. He stopped behind a patrol car with a siren that was just dying. We quickly got out and made our way around a television camera crew that was just setting up. A police cordon had been erected a few yards farther down the road. Garth was standing off to one side, staring intently down a hundred-yard stretch of sand to where three rotting boathouses jutted out over the water. I ran up to him and grabbed his arm.

"Garth!"

Garth turned and grinned when he saw me. He poked and prodded for a few seconds, presumably to see if I was all in one piece. When he was satisfied that I was, his grin faded.

"What the hell's going on here, Mongo? I've got my neck stuck out a mile."

"It's for a good cause. Garth, this is Ronald Tal and Ambassador Malakov. Gentlemen, my brother."

Garth nodded to the Ambassador and gave Tal a long, cold stare. "I talked to you on the phone," he said, perfunctorily shaking Tal's hand before turning back to me. "You didn't tell me the Feds would be here."

"Which boathouse is Rafferty in?"

"That's Rafferty in there with the machine gun?"

"It is. Where is he?"

"The one on the left," he said, jerking his thumb in that direction.

"Garth," I said, "Tal and I have to get down there."

"I will go too," the Ambassador said anxiously. "I go where you go."

"You'll get your heads blown off," Garth said. "It's quiet now. You should have been here five minutes ago."

"He won't shoot when he sees who it is," Tal said.

Garth snorted. "That's what you say."

It was suddenly very still. Somewhere in the distance the raucous whine of a powerboat carried clearly over the water; there was something disquieting, ominous about the sound.

"Garth," I said, "at least get us to Lippitt."

Garth took me by the elbow, led me around the barricade, and pointed twenty yards farther down the beach to where Lippitt and two other men were squatting down behind another barricade made up of the old, rotting husks of row- boats. All three had automatic pistols.

Lippitt!" I yelled. "Let us come down!"

Lippitt's bald head snapped around; the pale eyes found and focused on me. He hesitated a moment, then signaled to Garth, who was still holding me. His hand left my arm. Tal, Malakov, and I hurried across the sand. The two agents with Lippitt gave us a cursory glance as we dropped down behind the rowboats, then turned their attention-and their guns-back to the boathouse.

"What the hell are you trying to do?" I said, grabbing Lippitt's arm. "Didn't Rafferty explain his plan?"

"He didn't explain anything. He was the one who started shooting." He paused. "What's Malakov doing here?"

"Rafferty wants to negotiate," I said. "Malakov got a call too."

"Negotiate what, for Christ's sake? He's five years too late! Besides, we've tried to talk to him. He won't answer, and he won't let any of us come down. He may have gone crazy."

"He's not crazy! He's been buying time until we could get here. He called Tal, and I've spoken to him before. Maybe he'll talk to one of us now."

Lippitt rested one knee on the sand and looked at me. "When did you talk to him?"

"A few days ago, but I didn't know he was Victor Rafferty. He's been using the name Elliot Thomas. He's been working as an engineer at the U.N. The sketch of the Nately Museum was his. The paper must have dropped out of his pocket, or he just forgot and left it on the table. He's ready to give himself up … under the auspices of the U.N."

Speaking in a low monotone, Tal outlined Rafferty's plan to Lippitt. Lippitt's face was totally impassive as he listened. The sound of the powerboat was much louder now, coming closer. Far out in the water I could see sunlight glinting off its metal hull.

Tal finished as Lippitt absently began drawing figures in the sand with his finger.

"What do you think?" I said to the agent.

"I don't know," Lippitt said without looking up. "You're suggesting that the United States give up-"

"You can't have him, Lippitt," Tal broke in impatiently. "Your only alternative is to kill him, and I don't think you want to do that. He won't let anyone use him; he gave up everything to make that point, and he's not going to change his mind now. What he suggests is the only way."

"I can't authorize something like that on my own, Tal," Lippitt said quietly.

"I know. But what do you think of the idea?"

Lippitt erased the drawings in the sand, glanced up, and said in the same soft tone: "It could work. What's your reaction, Malakov?"

The portly Russian slowly nodded his head. "I too must have authorization, but what Rafferty suggests does… seem to be a viable alternative."

I hadn't realized I'd been holding my breath until it came out of me in a long sigh. My stomach hurt.

Tal stood up. "I'm going down there. I'll tell him what the two of you just said, and I'll see what he has to say. In the meantime, you can contact your superiors."

Lippitt shook his head. "It's going to take a lot longer than a few minutes to make this kind of decision."

"How much longer?"

"At least a couple of days. I'll go to Washington myself."

"Let him come with me in the meantime," Tal said quickly. "The important thing is to get him out of that boat house, right?"

"What if our government says it's no deal?" I asked Lippitt.

"I don't know," Lippitt said evenly. "No promises."

"Do not take us for fools," Malakov said tightly. "One of my men must accompany Rafferty at all times until a decision is made."

"Whatever you say, Mr. Ambassador," Lippitt said coldly. "One of my men will be along too."

"Let's see what Rafferty has to say," Tal said as he stepped out from behind the rowboats, in full view of the boathouse. He cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled: "Rafferty! It's Tal! Don't shoot! I'm coming down!"

There was no answer, no sound at all from the direction of the water except the steadily increasing roar of the speedboat. The craft was close now, no more than three or four hundred yards offshore, and it was making me nervous.

Malakov grabbed Lippitt's elbow. "How do you know he's still in there? He may have slipped away from you again!"

"He's surrounded," Lippitt said, jerking his arm free. "I've got men with rifles on the roofs of the other boathouses; there's no way Rafferty can get out of there without being shot. Rafferty may be a lot of things, but he's not invisible."

"Okay," Tal said softly, "I'm going down."

"Hold it!" I yelled as I stood and pointed toward the water. "What's that boat out there doing?!"

Lippitt tore the binoculars from the neck of the agent squatting next to him and raised them to his eyes. I watched the muscles in his jaw and neck begin to quiver. He threw the binoculars to one side, then turned to the crowd of police and agents behind him. "Shoot that boat out of the water!" he yelled. "Goddamn it, blow it away!"

Immediately the air was filled with the din of automatic- weapons fire. Two agents sprinted out onto the sand and began firing down at the water, their guns braced against their hips.

"There's no one in the boat!" Lippitt shouted. I could barely hear him above the clatter of the weapons. "It's a drone, radio-controlled! Somebody wants to blow Rafferty up!"

The pilotless boat zigzagged as the rain of bullets fell into the water around it; there were dozens of hits, but the boat kept coming. It wasn't going to stop until it hit the boat house.

"He's got to see it coming," Tal said through clenched teeth. "Why doesn't he get out of there?" He again cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled. "Thomas! Rafferty! Get out of there! Run!"

A bearded figure immediately recognizable as Elliot Thomas suddenly appeared in the doorway of the crumbling boathouse. He was carrying an automatic assault rifle. He seemed to be groggy as he staggered out onto the sand, fell back against the side of the house, and began firing up the beach in our direction. Bullets whined in the air, chewed up the sand, thwacked into the wooden barricades.

Lippitt yelled, "Hold your fire!"

I caught a flash of movement out of the corner of my eye. It was Garth sprinting toward the boathouse, his arms pumping. Tal's reflexes were faster than mine. He tackled Garth at the knees and both men went down. Garth took a swing at Tal's head, missed, then tried to struggle to his feet again as Tal hung on to his legs. I tried not to think of the bullets singing around my head as I ran forward, jumped on Garth's back, wrapped my arms around his neck.

"You can't just let that man die down there without making an effort to get him out!" Garth shouted, clawing at my arms.

"It's too late," Tal said quietly.

The boat hit the rotting wood structure and exploded. It was something a lot more powerful than dynamite, probably plastique. The force of the blast shook the ground around us. The entire boathouse quivered for a moment, lifted off the ground, then disintegrated into bits and pieces of wood and metal. Instantly flames shot up into the temporary vacuum, burning with the white-hot glow of phosphorus or napalm.

Someone had wanted to make certain the job was done right.