The Trial, page 9
part #91 of The Executioner Series
"You never know."
Brognola was not concerned with cleanliness, of course, but with electronic ears that might be concealed inside the cell. Bolan had already checked it out, but points of vulnerability remained. The heater duct. The corridor outside.
"Aw, what the hell."
Brognola turned to face him, hand outstretched, and Bolan clasped it in his own. The lawman's grip was firm, as he had remembered it, but Bolan was surprised to note a trace of moisture in Brognola's palm.
The man from Washington was nervous, sure, as he had every right to be. The wrong word, overheard by hostile ears, could finish his career in government. But there was something more behind the eyes, and Bolan quickly realized that Hal's predominant emotion was not personal anxiety but rather a concern for the survival of a friend.
"We've got ourselves a mess this time."
It was a classic understatement, but the big Fed's use of "we" had not been lost on Bolan.
"It's a frame."
Brognola waved the words away. "Hell, I know that. You didn't need to tell me." He sounded hurt, as if his friendship had been questioned. "Anyway, this local beefs the least of it. This time tomorrow you'll be ass-deep in uniforms flown in from Hollywood to Timbuktu. How did they get your name?"
"I guess I let it slip."
Brognola snorted, knowing that the hellfire warrior hadn't made a slip like that in all his life.
"I guess you had your reasons."
"I was buying time. And that reminds me. There'll be files to burn."
The man from Justice nodded. "I'll see to it." Then he frowned. "It seems to me that you were buying trouble."
Bolan shook his head. "The trouble was already waiting for me here. Somebody set me up. They knew that I was coming and they ran me through a classic suck. They didn't miss a trick."
"Who's 'they'?"
The soldier's shrug was almost casual. "An enemy."
"That helps. I'd say it cuts the suspects down to roughly half the population of the globe."
Bolan recognized frustration in his old friend's voice, but there was no time to soothe the Fed's injured feelings. Survival was the top priority, and it would soon demand all his attention.
"Offhand, I'd say it was the families. I don't see any foreign tracks."
Brognola met the soldier's eyes. "All right. I'll see what I can do."
"You can't do anything," the warrior told him flatly. "Let it go."
"Like hell." There was an angry spark behind Brognola's eyes. "They've got you staked out here like 'gator bait. I've started rattling some cages. I'll have a troop of marshals in by eight o'clock tomorrow."
Bolan sat down on the rigid cot, leaving room for Hal at the other end. A creeping weariness seemed to possess him now, and he repulsed it with a force of will.
"You won't get anywhere with jurisdictional disputes," he told the man from Washington. "The murder takes priority. We both know that. The state won't extradite until they're finished with the trial."
Brognola looked surprised. "You're counting on a day in court?"
The Bolan smile was fatalistic, almost peaceful. "I'm demanding it as soon as possible. If I can get that far..."
The soldier let the sentence trail away, and Brognola made a show of studying his dusty shoes. It took a moment for the Fed to find his voice again.
"The opposition doesn't want you on a witness stand."
"I'm counting on it," Bolan answered. "The longer I stay locked up here, the better chance they have to pick me off. Out there..." he nodded toward the far end of the corridor "...at least I've got a chance."
"Some chance."
"We play the cards the way they fall."
"Somebody's dealing second on you here. We need to even up the odds."
"There's nothing you can do."
"Goddamn it!"
Silence stretched between them for a moment, and Brognola was the first to breach the wall. "I'm bringing in the marshals anyway."
"Okay."
"It can't hurt." Mack Bolan sensed his friend was talking almost to himself, as if to fill the void, and did not interrupt. "We've got an angle now, with civil rights, security, the whole damn thing. I'm going to keep the pressure on. Material witness, vital information, that kind of thing."
"It can't hurt," the soldier echoed, knowing that it wouldn't really help him either.
"Right." Before the silence could envelop them again, Brognola raised his eyes to meet the soldier's own. "What happened here tonight?"
"I guess they filled you in upstairs. I had an unexpected visitor."
"The jailer set you up?"
The warrior shrugged. "It wouldn't be unheard of. Anyway, I gather that the guy in charge is AWOL at the moment. They've been looking for him high and low."
Brognola's eyes and voice were hard. "I'd like to have a word with him myself."
"No point. He'd say he took his orders on the phone and picked up payment through a drop somewhere. He's at the bottom of the food chain here."
"There's still a chance that he could lead us back to bigger fish," Brognola growled.
"It's local," Bolan answered. "And you can't afford to step on any toes."
"I've got a stake in this," the man from Washington replied almost defensively. "You're still a federal fugitive, remember?"
Bolan grinned. "It's nice to be wanted."
"Well, shit."
Brognola's smile was hesitant at first as if the very thought of levity in these surroundings summoned pangs of guilt. And still it was too much. After a moment his booming laugh reverberated through the cell block, echoing along the corridor.
Bolan joined the laughter, easily, the tension flowing out of him. It was a therapeutic moment, sharing much in common with a damned good cry, but neither man could summon tears.
The moment passed, and Hal was staring at his oldest living friend self-consciously, embarrassment giving color to his cheeks.
"We ought to take this on the road."
"When do we leave?"
They didn't laugh this time. It was enough to smile and to clasp their hands together in what might be temporary parting, or a last farewell.
"I'll be around. You're not alone in this."
But even as he spoke the hollow words, Brognola's eyes were mirrors of the truth.
Mack Bolan was alone, as much as he had ever been since the beginning of his private, everlasting war against the savages. He was alone inside his tiny cell in the eye of the impending storm. When everything exploded, the Man from Blood would stand or fall as he had lived.
Alone.
He shook the morbid thoughts away, refusing to adopt defeatist attitudes. Deep inside the soldier knew that he had never truly been alone. There had been Johnny — even in the days before the "kid" had become a man and had opted to enlist beside his brother in the long crusade. There had been Valentina, Leo, April Rose... and many more.
The cell was crowded suddenly with memories and friendly ghosts, surrounding Bolan, pressing in upon him, lending warmth like some invisible but hearty flame. It would have been a claustrophobic moment under other circumstances, with another man, but warrior Bolan welcomed the company and silently invited them to stay a while.
As for Brognola, it was time to go. Bolan's longtime ally reluctantly released the soldier's hand, retreating toward the door on leaden feet.
"You watch yourself," he ordered gruffly, turning to avert his face before fluorescent lighting caught the hint of moisture in his eyes.
Almost in time.
"I will," the soldier told the Fed's retreating back. "You do the same."
"Damn straight."
Brognola hailed his escort, and the deputy responded with alacrity. Another silent signal was made to the turnkey, and the door was opened long enough for Hal to make his getaway.
"I'll be in touch," Brognola called out to the warrior from the far side of the bars.
"I'll be right here."
The sound of their footsteps faded, finally lost behind the slamming of the cell block's outer door.
And Mack Bolan was alone again with all the friendly ghosts.
12
The sheriff killed his cruiser's headlights half a block from Billy Putnam's house and coasted down the narrow residential street in darkness, his eyes and other senses rapidly adjusting to the night. There were no streetlights here, and there was no illumination from the aging tract homes lining Elm. It was a neighborhood of honest working men and women and they would be asleep by now, unmindful of the squad car as it rumbled to a halt behind another of its kind.
Hank Musgrove ambled back to meet the sheriff, big hands clasped around the buckle of his pistol belt. The Stetson cast a shadow on his face, but Sheriff Kendricks caught the bare suggestion of a smile beneath the wide-brimmed hat as Musgrove leaned over to greet him through the driver's window.
Bo Kendricks had no time for the preliminaries. "Still inside?"
Musgrove nodded his head jerkily, wobbling the Stetson's brim. "As far as I can tell. His car ain't moved, an' there's some kinda light on in the back. I haven't seen him, mind you, but you said..."
"I know what I said. He still not answering the phone?"
"Nobody's tried since I reported in."
"Try him now."
"You got it."
Musgrove ambled back to his cruiser, reached in through the open window and snared the dashboard mike. He raised the night dispatcher and issued orders, then he and Kendricks waited in the darkness across the narrow street from Billy Putnam's one-bedroom house.
Soon the muffled trilling of a telephone was barely audible from somewhere in the house. Bo Kendricks waited, counting off a dozen rings before he satisfied himself that Putnam wasn't coming on the line.
"Enough."
Hank Musgrove muttered something into the microphone and then dropped it on the driver's seat. Across the street, Billy Putnam's phone fell silent once again.
"I'm going in," Bo Kendricks said at length.
"I'll back you up."
The sheriff thought about it briefly, then shook his head. "Stay put. If Billy rabbits, you'll be here to close the door."
"I'll slam it on his friggin' head."
Kendricks nailed the deputy with penetrating eyes. "You'll do no such goddamn thing. I want him fit to talk. You understand that, Hank?"
"I hear you."
"'Kay."
The sheriff drew his weapon, a big Colt Python. The weight of it was reassuring as he crossed the darkened street and made his way over Billy Putnam's scrubby lawn. He kept to the grass, eyes scanning darkened windows for any sign of movement as he paralleled the driveway, circling around the side and toward the rear of Putnam's tract house, knowing it would do no good to try the bell.
Putnam wasn't answering the phone, and he would damn sure not be answering the door. Bo Kendricks sensed it as a hunter sometimes feels his prey. He knew that Billy was prepared to run, that he would clear out before he had to answer for the grim fiasco at the jail.
As Musgrove had described, there was a light on in the rear of Putnam's house. Kendricks reached the small backyard and recognized it as the bathroom light, providing scant illumination through a frosted windowpane.
Looks like I caught you with your pants down, Billy. Kendricks smiled at the thought, but he was still cautious as he mounted the concrete steps to stand outside Putnam's kitchen door.
An image came to Kendricks as his fingers closed around the doorknob. It would be unlocked, and as he'd ease the back door open, he'd catch a heartbeat glimpse of Putnam standing in the darkened kitchen with a double-barreled twelve-gauge raised to greet him, muzzles like two trash cans aimed directly at his face. And that would be all, before the silent night would explode in his face and he'd be blown across the scruffy yard like so much garbage in a rising summer wind.
The moment passed, and Kendricks gripped the doorknob tighter to prevent his hand from trembling. Perspiration beaded on his forehead beneath the Stetson's brim, and Kendricks forced his mind away from grisly images of death by concentrating on the knob, the lock, the pistol in his hand.
The door was unlocked, and Kendricks inched it open, bracing for any hint of sudden movement within the dark interior. When nothing stirred, he stepped back, gave the door a gentle push and let it swing wide open on its own momentum.
Darkness beckoned Kendricks on inside the house, a different darkness, without the dappled moonlight of the yard outside. His eyes required another moment to adjust, to find the glimmer of the bathroom light that spilled from a doorway just ahead.
Alert to any sound, the sheriff eased his way across the kitchen, stopping dead and cursing underneath his breath when he collided with the corner of a table, fearing that the muffled sound might carry throughout the house and warn his prey that he was coming.
But Billy had to know as much already. He wasn't stupid — not that stupid, anyway. He had been smart enough to break for it when things had gone sour at the courthouse, though his mind had not been swift enough to realize that it couldn't have ended any other way. If the imported killer had succeeded in eliminating Bolan, there still would have been a million searching questions to be answered. The jailer hadn't thought of that, or else had thought of it too late to save himself.
And he was in it now. Hip-deep and sinking fast. There still might be a chance for him to save himself, to salvage something from the wreckage of his thirteen-year career, providing that he leveled with the sheriff and gave all the answers Kendricks sought.
The sheriff's hand clenched tighter on the Python's grip. He gained the open doorway and edged around the corner, feeling terribly exposed and vulnerable in the corridor. Putnam might be waiting for him in the darkened bedroom dead ahead, or crouching down behind the sofa in the living room to Kendricks's left, prepared to open up with God knows what the moment a target was presented. Kendricks fought a sudden urge to creep along the corridor on hands and knees, the sudden fear replaced by anger and determination.
And whatever happened here tonight, Bo Kendricks meant to face it standing.
The corridor was narrow and short in relative proportion to the tiny floor plan of the house. He recognized the bathroom door, distinguished by the wedge of yellow light that seeped beneath it, casting ragged shadows where the carpet pile was worn unevenly. The light could be a trap, but he would have to take the chance.
A floorboard creaked beneath his weight, and Kendricks held his breath, the Magnum braced in both hands now as he advanced on the bathroom door. At last he stood before it. He crouched, deciding in an instant that he could not let Putnam have an edge if he intended to succeed. If he intended to survive.
A flying kick to the doorknob sent the flimsy wooden frame and cheapjack locking mechanism inward. The door banged against the plaster wall, rebounding, and would have slammed back in his face if Kendricks hadn't blocked it with his shoulder, filling up the narrow doorway with his bulk. The sudden glare of light was almost blinding to his narrowed eyes.
The bathroom was a slaughterhouse.
It took a moment for the sheriff to take in the ghastly scene that lay before his eyes. Then came the shock, a numbing sickness that began in Kendricks's stomach and immediately touched his soul.
The one-time jailer, Billy Putnam, faced him from across the tiny room, his dead eyes staring back at Kendricks, locking with his own. Reclining in the bathtub with his back against the tile, his legs and feet suspended from the rim and dangling limply toward the floor, the deputy was still in uniform. His khaki shirt was drenched in dark, congealing blood; the tub and tiles were smeared and spattered with it, dripping with the crimson evidence of Billy Putnam's life.
The jailer's fleshy throat was open, slashed not quite from ear to ear, but wide and deep enough to do the job. A mottled flap of skin hung down across his collar like a limp cravat, exposing severed larynx and arteries beneath the harsh, uncompromising light. In retrospect the sheriff could imagine how the blood had spurted from that massive wound, propelled by the convulsive action of a dying heart. And glancing up, on impulse, Kendricks was revolted by the drying, brownish raindrop patterns on the ceiling.
His jailer was a frigging human geyser — or he had been — before the juice had run out.
Bo Kendricks slipped the Python back inside its swivel holster, sensing that he was alone now in this house of death. He edged around the larger of the bloodstains on the floor, intent on leaving evidence intact, and bent to take a closer look at Billy Putnam's remains.
The bone-handled straight razor was still clutched between the fingers of a limp, dead hand. The blade and handle, pudgy fist and dirty fingernails, were caked with drying blood.
The sheriff studied Billy Putnam for another moment, hard eyes noting every detail of the corpse's posture and attire, and when he straightened Kendricks knew that there was nothing more for him to learn inside the bathroom abattoir. He was already moving toward the door, retreating, when he heard a furtive movement in the corridor outside.
The Python found his hand, and Kendricks sighted on the open doorway, squinting down the barrel rib, already tightening his finger on the trigger, anxious for a target now. A heavy footfall scuffed against the carpet just beyond his line of sight.
Come on, you bastard. Come and get it.
"Easy, Sheriff, hold the phone!"
Hank Musgrove raised his hands, and the sheriff felt himself relax inside. The vanishing disappointment was replaced by sweet relief and that in turn gave way to sudden anger.
"Dammit, Hank, you were supposed to wait outside!"
"I did. We got some backup, and I left 'em to it. Figured you could use a hand in here."
The sheriff stepped aside to let him catch a glimpse of Putnam.
"We're too damned late," he said.
The deputy brushed past him, stopping at the outer limits of the sprayed blood, standing on his toes and straining for a better look inside the makeshift killing vat. Bo Kendricks had already seen enough. He turned away and sought the clean, cool air outside. Hank Musgrove caught up with him in the yard.
"Do you believe that nervy bastard?" There was awe and something like suppressed excitement in his voice. "I mean, to cut his own damned throat that way."
