Sudden prey

TWENTY-EIGHT

THE KID BEGAN TO CRY AS THEY PASSED THE METRODOME, and when LaChaise yelled at him, told him to shut up, he simply cried harder, holding on to the top of the steering wheel with both hands, tears pouring down his face.

LaChaise finally pushed himself up into the seat beside him and pointed the way: down to Washington, right, around a curve to a lighted sign that said several things, but concluded with ''Jesus Saves,'' down a ramp and onto a covered bridge.

''Shut up, for Christ's sakes, you do this right, I won't hurt you.''

''I know you,'' the kid said, ''you're gonna kill me.''

''I ain't gonna fuckin' kill you if you do right; I got no quarrel with you.''

But the kid started up again and LaChaise said, ''Jesus Christ,'' in disgust, and they rolled off the bridge past the beer-can building, up the hill to

Harvard Street.

''Turn,'' LaChaise said. The kid stopped weeping long enough to get around the corner, and before he could startagain, LaChaise said, ''Go straight ahead to that turnaround and then stop.''

''You gonna kill me there?''

''I'm not gonna fuckin' kill you, unless you get smart,'' LaChaise said. ''Just stop there and let me out, and go on your way.''

There were a half-dozen people on the street, coming and going from the hospital, slip-sliding down the sidewalks. Operations took place early in the morning. LaChaise had had two operations himself, for an appendix and to get a skin patch put over a bad case of road rash, and both times, they'd woken him up at dawn for the trip down to the operating room.

''Right there,'' he said, ''behind that red Chevy.''

The kid pulled in behind the Chevy, and LaChaise eased himself out, the backs of his legs on fire. The kid was looking at the gun and LaChaise grinned at him and dug into his jeans, found the remnant of the cash they'd taken from Harp, pulled out the wad of bills and threw it on the passenger seat. A couple of thousand dollars, anyway. ''Thanks for the ride,'' he said, and he stepped away from the car and slammed the door, and walked up to the hospital entrance.

He felt like a cowboy.

He carried his own pistol, the 'dog. 44, in his right hand, and pulled Martin's pistol out of his left pocket, and pushed through the doors using his elbows.

An information counter was just inside the doors to the right. A security guard sat behind the desk, watching a portable television. Three more people, two women and a man in a white medical jacket, were scattered around the lobby chairs, the women reading, the man staring sightlessly at the wall, as though he'd made an unforgivable error somewhere.

LaChaise walked over to the guard, who looked up only at the last minute, a smile dying a sudden death. LaChaisepointed the two guns at the guard's chest and said, ''Walk me up to the operating rooms or I'll kill you.''

The guard looked at the guns, then at LaChaise, and then, slowly, stupidly, at the television: ''They're looking for you,'' he said.

''No shit. Now get out of there and walk me up to the operating rooms. You got five seconds, then I kill you.''

''This way,'' the guard said. He came out from behind the desk, his hands held at shoulder height. He was unarmed. The three people in the lobby were looking at them, but nobody moved from their seats. ''There's another guy coming in, in one second,'' LaChaise said to the room in general. ''If anybody's moving, anybody's standing up, he'll kill you. Sit tight and you'll be okay. I'm Dick

LaChaise, that you seen on TV, and I'm here on business.''

The sound of the line pleased him; it sounded cowboy-like. They walked a few feet down a corridor, around a corner to the right, to a bank of elevators. The guard pushed the elevator button and the doors slid open. ''Three,'' he said, as they got inside. ''You gonna kill me?''

''Not if you do what I tell you,'' LaChaise said. ''When we get to three, you stay in the car and ride until you get to the top.'' LaChaise pushed all the buttons higher than three, and a bell rang and the door opened, and LaChaise waved the gun at the guard and said, ''I'll stand here until the doors are closed. If you get off before the top, somebody'll shoot your ass. Got that?''

''Yes, sir,'' the guard said, as the doors closed.

AT THE END OF THE HALL, DOUBLE DOORS LED TO THE operating suite. To his right, an elderly man sat in a chair reading Modern Maturity. He looked up, sucked on his teeth, and looked back at the magazine. LaChaise had the odd impression that he hadn't noticed the guns.

Nobody else in sight. LaChaise went to the double doors, pushed through, found himself in a nursing station. Two nurses were looking at a clipboard, and one of them was saying, ''… must be stealing scrubs again. They're all his size, and it's only the new ones…''

They both looked up at the same time. LaChaise was there in his heavy dark coat, dripping water from the melting snow, his eyes dark and two guns in his hand. He said, ''Ladies, I need to see Dr. Weather Karkinnen.''

The taller and younger of the two nurses said, ''Oh, shit,'' and the older, shorter one shook her head and said, ''You can't. She's operating.''

''Then let's go down to the operating room and see her.''

''You're not authorized,'' the older woman said.

''If you don't show me, I'm going to kill one of you, and then the other one will show me, I bet. Who do I kill?'' He pulled back the hammer on the 'dog, and the catches ratcheted in the silence. The two nurses looked at each other, then the older one began to sniffle, the way the boy in the car had; and the younger one said, finally, ''I'll show you.''

She led the way through another set of doors, stopped outside of a single wide door, stood on tiptoe to look through a window and then stepped back and said sadly, ''In there.''

''If she's not, I'll be back,'' LaChaise said, holding her eyes. The woman looked away, and LaChaise bumped through the door.

WEATHER HAD HER EYES TO THE OPERATING MICROSCOPE while her hands made the delicate loops that produced square knots in the nearly invisible suture material. She'd just said, ''If you actually listen to The Doors you start to laugh; listen to the words of 'L. A. Woman' sometime and tell me they're not.. .''

The door banged open and she almost jumped, and everybodyturned and, without looking up, she said, ''Who in the fuck did that?''

''I did,'' LaChaise said.

Weather finished the knot and then looked up from the scope, blinked and saw him there, with the two pistols.

''Who's Weather Karkinnen?''

''I am,'' Weather said. He pointed a pistol at her and she closed her eyes.

''Come out of there.''

She opened her eyes again and said, ''I can't stop now. If I stop now, this little girl will lose her thumb and she'll go through life like that.''

LaChaise took a mental step back, confused: ''What?''

''I said, if I quit now…''

''I heard that,'' he snapped. ''What're you doing?''

''I'm hooking up an artery. She had a benign tumor and we removed it and now we're hooking up the two ends of the artery to get the blood supply going again.''

''Well, how long will it take?''

Weather looked back through the operating microscope. ''Twenty minutes.''

''You've got five,'' he said. And he said, ''You're really short for a doctor.''

Weather looked away again, and asked, ''Are you going to kill everybody in here?''

''Depends,'' LaChaise said.

''If I get another doctor in here, he could finish for me.''

''Get him.''

''Not if you're going to hurt him, or the others.''

''I won't hurt him if he doesn't fuck with me.''

Weather looked at the circulating nurse and said, ''Betty, go down and ask Dr.

Feldman to step in here, if he would.''

LaChaise looked at the nurse and said, ''Go. And if you fuck with me…''

Weather went back to the microscope and they all waited, silently, her hands barely moving, for two or three minutes, when a man in an operating gown bumped hip-first into the room, his hands at chest level. ''What's going on?''

LaChaise pointed one of the guns at him, and Weather said, ''We've got a gentleman with a gun. Two guns, in fact. He wants to talk with me.''

''The police are coming,'' the new doctor said to LaChaise. In the sterile operating theater, LaChaise looked like a rat on a cheesecake.

''They're always coming,'' LaChaise said.

''However this works out, we've got to finish this,'' Weather said to Feldman, her voice steady. ''Could you take a look?''

The operating scope had two eyepieces, and Feldman, his hands still pressed to his chest, stepped to the operating table opposite Weather and looked into the second eyepiece. ''You're almost done.''

''I need to put in two more knots, and then it's a matter of closing…''

She gave him a quick brief on the operation, and finished one of the two knots.

''One more,'' she said.

''I've got to go down and back off mine,'' Feldman said.

''How far are you in?'' Weather asked.

''Not in,'' Feldman said. ''We were just getting the anesthesia started…

I'll be back.''

He went with such authority that LaChaise let him go without objection. Weather was working in the incision again, and one of the nurses said, ''If I stay here,

I'll pee my pants.''

''Then go,'' Weather said. ''Everybody else okay?''

They were okay. The nurse who thought she might pee her pants decided to stay with them.

Feldman returned: ''Where are we?''

''Just finishing,'' Weather said calmly. ''See?''

Feldman looked through the scope and said, ''Nice. But I think you might need one more, at…''

He was stalling. Weather said, ''I think that should be all right.'' Feldman looked at her and she gave a small shake of the head. ''You sure?''

''Better to get him out of here,'' Weather said.

''What's going on?'' LaChaise demanded.

''Trying to figure out what we can do here,'' Feldman snapped. ''We're right in the middle of things.''

Weather stepped back from the table. ''But I'm done,'' she said. She looked at

LaChaise. ''Now what?''

''Outa here. We need a phone. Someplace where they can't get at me.''

''There's an office at the end of the hall.''

''Let's go,'' he said, waving the pistol at her.

THE OUTER AREA WAS DESERTED. THE NURSES HAD gone, and the cops hadn't arrived yet. Weather pulled off her mask and peeled off the first of her gloves and said, ''What're you going to do?''

''Talk to your old man,'' LaChaise said.

And kill her, while they were on the phone, she thought. She came to the office and said, ''In there. There's a phone.''

She gestured and she went through ahead of him, turned. ''You have a lot of choices to make,'' she said.

''Shut up. What's your old man's number?''

''You could probably dial 911 and they could patch you through. He's out there in his car.''

''Do it, and hand me the phone…''

Weather punched 911 and handed it to him. He listened a minute, the gun muzzle steady on her chest, and said, ''This is Dick LaChaise. I want to talk to Lucas

Davenport. I'm at the hospital and I'm pointing a gun at his old lady, Dr.

Karkinnen.''

Weather said, ''You don't have much time left: you better start thinking this through.''

''I said, shut up.''

''Why? Because if I don't you're gonna kill me? You're already planning to kill me.''

''You don't want it to come no sooner than it has to…'' Then he said to the phone, ''Well, get him on. Well, when is he gonna be… Yeah? You tell him to call…'' He looked at the phone, but there was no number, and he looked at

Weather.

''The surgery suite,'' Weather said. Lucas wouldn't get on the phone. He knew what LaChaise would do.

''The surgery suite,'' LaChaise repeated, and he hung up. ''He's on foot somewhere. They're getting him.''

Weather said, ''I've got to sit down,'' and she dropped in the chair on the other side of the desk. ''Look, you're either going to have to shoot me or listen to me, and I think you better listen: My friend Davenport will get here in a few minutes, and if you kill me, he'll kill you. You can forget all about rules and regulations and laws; he'll kill you.''

''Like he killed my old lady and my sister.''

She bobbed her head. ''Yes. He set that up. I talked to him about it, because I couldn't believe he did it. It's caused us some trouble. But when he thinks he's right, he won't turn. And if you kill me…'' She shrugged. ''That's the end for both of us. You won't walk out of here.''

''I ain't walking out anyway.''

Now he looked at her, and she saw that she was still wearing one glove, and she pulled it off slowly, watching his eyes.

''There's no death penalty either in Wisconsin or Minnesota. You escaped once.

You might have to wait for a while, but there's always the chance that you could be free again. One way or another.''

''Bullshit, they're gonna kill me.''

''No, they won't. Not if you wait a while. They have all kinds of rules. And once you're on television, they won't be able to take you off and shoot you somewhere. Once you're in the system, you'll be safe. My husband, my friend.. .''

''Is he your husband or your friend?''

''We're planning to get married in a couple of months. We live together… If you make a deal with him, he won't kill you. But if you shoot me, you can make any kind of deal you want-you can make a deal with the President-and he'll kill you anyway.''

He grinned, and said, ''Yeah, tough guy,'' but he was thinking. He thought about

Martin, probably dead already, going cold in the snow somewhere, and he said,

''They'd stick me in the Black Hole of Calcutta.''

''Probably, for a while,'' she agreed. ''Then something bigger and dirtier would come along, and they'll start to forget about you, and they'll give you a little air. Then you'll have a chance. If you die now… that's it. No court, no TV time, no interviews, no nothing.''

''Well, fuck that,'' LaChaise said. ''Let's see what your old man says.''

Weather took a breath: it was a start. ''You're bleeding,'' she said. ''We could get a first-aid kit.''