"I think I can get him to," Foster said.
"Yes indeed. I'll guarantee whatever he wants. Put a big red seal on it. Ribbons too. I can't get an existing-sentence reduction -"
"No. I'm sure he understands that."
"But I'll guarantee we don't go sticking those little needles in his arm."
"Lou. The state assistant attorney general is here. He's guaranteeing that they won't go after the death penalty if you surrender."
"Yeah?" There was a pause, the sound of a hand over the receiver. Then: "Same for my boy Shep here?"
Foster frowned. LeBow turned his computer to her and she read about Wilcox, She looked at the AG, who nodded.
"Sure, Lou. Both of you. And the other guy with you?"
Potter thought: Son of a bitch had himself an accident.
Handy laughed. "Had a accident."
Foster lifted an inquiring eyebrow to Potter, who said, "Believed dead."
"Okay, you and Wilcox," the blond detective said, "you got a deal."
The same deal that Potter, through Charlie Budd, had offered him. Why was Handy accepting it now? A moment later he found out.
"Hold up, you frigid bitch. That's not all."
"I love it when you talk dirty, Lou."
"I also want a guarantee to stay outta Callana. I killed that guard there. I go back and they'll pound me to death for sure. No more federal time."
Foster looked once more at Potter, who nodded to Tobe. "Call Justice," he whispered. "Dick Allen."
The deputy attorney general in Washington.
"Lou," Foster said, "We're checking on it now."
Potter again anticipated: I'm still horny. Let's fuck.
Handy's voice brightened and the old devil was back. "Come sit on my cock while we're waiting."
"I would, Lou, but I don't know where it's been."
"In my Jockeys for way too long."
"Just keep it there for a while longer then."
Potter was patched through to Allen, who listened and agreed reluctantly that if Handy was willing to surrender he could serve his state time first. Allen would also waive the federal charges for the escape though not for the murder of the guard. The practical effect of this was that Handy wouldn't have to surrender to any federal jailers until about fifty years after he'd died of old age.
Foster relayed this to Handy. There was a long pause. A moment later Handy's voice said, "Okay, we'll do it."
Foster looked at Potter with a cocked eyebrow. He nodded numbly, dumbfounded.
"But I gotta see it in writing," Handy said.
"Okay, Lou. We can arrange that."
Potter was already writing the terms out longhand. He handed the sheet to Henry LeBow to type and print out.
"So, that's it," LeBow said, eyes on his blue screen. "Score one for the good guys."
Laughter broke out. Potter's face burned as he watched the elation on the faces of Budd and the other federal agents. He smiled too but he understood – as did no one else on the threat management team – that he had both won and lost. And he knew that it was not his strength or courage or intelligence that had failed him but his judgment.
Which is the worst defeat a man can suffer.
"Here we go," LeBow said, offering the printout to Potter. He and Marks signed the document and Stevie Gates made one last run to the slaughterhouse. When he returned he wore a perplexed expression and carried a bottle of Corona beer, which Handy had given him.
"Agent Potter?" Sharon Foster had apparently been calling his name several times. He looked up. "Would you like to coordinate the surrender?"
He stared at her for a moment and nodded. "Yes, of course. Tobe, call Dean Stillwell. Ask him to please come in here."
Tobe made the call. Unfazed, LeBow continued to type in information on the incident log. Detective Sharon Foster glanced at Potter with a look that he took to be one of sympathy; it was patronizing and hurt far more than a snide smile of triumph would have. As he looked at her he felt suddenly very old – as if everything he'd known and done in his life, every way he looked at things, every word he'd said to strangers and to friends was, in an instant, outmoded and invalid. If not an outright lie.
He was in camouflage gear so no one saw the lean man lying in a stand of starkly white birch not far from the command van.
His hands clasped the night-vision binoculars, sweat dotting his palms copiously.
Dan Tremain had been frozen in this position for an hour, during which time a helicopter had come and gone, the federal HRT had arrived and assembled nearby, and a squad car had streaked up to the van, bearing a young policewoman.
Tremain had taken in the news, which was spreading like fire in a wheat field from trooper to trooper, that Handy had decided to give it up in exchange for an agreement not to seek the death penalty.
But for Dan Tremain this wasn't acceptable.
His trooper, young Joey Wilson, and that poor girl this afternoon had not died so that Lou Handy might live long enough to kill again, certainly to gloat and relive the perverse joy at the carnage he'd caused throughout his pointless life.
Sacrifice was sometimes necessary. And who better than a soldier to give up his life in the name of justice?
"Surrender in ten minutes," a voice called from behind him. Tremain could not possibly have said whether it was the voice of a trooper or that of an angel dipping low from God's own heaven to make this announcement. In any event he nodded and rose to his feet. He stood tall, wiped the tears from his face, adjusted his uniform, brushed his hair with his fingers. Never one to preen, Tremain had decided it was important that he look strong and resolute and proud when he ended his career in the dramatic fashion he had planned.
11:18 P.M.
Surrender is the most critical stage of a barricade.
More lives are lost in surrenders than during any other phase of hostage situations except assaults. And this one would be particularly tricky, Potter knew, because the essence of surrender was Handy's nemesis – giving up control.
Again his natural impatience prodded him to get things over with, to get Handy into custody. But he had to fight this urge. He was running the surrender by the book and had assembled the threat management team before him in the van.
The first thing he did was shake Dean Stillwell's hand. "Dean, I'm putting Frank and the Bureau's HRT in charge of containment and tactical matters now. You've done a fine job. It's just that Frank and I've done this in the past a number of times."
"No problem at all, Arthur. I'm honored you let me help." To Potter's embarrassment Stillwell snapped a salute, which the agent reluctantly returned.
Budd, LeBow, Tobe, and D'Angelo all hunched over the terrain maps and diagram of the slaughterhouse as Potter went through the procedure. Angie, who had no tactical experience and could offer little assistance to D'Angelo and the HRT, was escorting Emily and Beverly to the Days Inn. Intense, young Detective Sharon Foster was outside smoking – very real Camels. Frances was in the van, waiting patiently.
"Everybody's going to be wired up and half-nuts," Potter said. "Our people and the takers. We're all tired and there's going to be a lot of carelessness. So we have to choreograph every step." He fell silent and was looking out the window at the square yellow eyes of the building.
"Arthur?" LeBow said.
He meant, Time's awasting.
"Yes, sure."
They bent over the map and he began to give commands. It seemed to him that he'd lost his voice completely and he was surprised to find that the men who stood before him nodded gravely as if listening to words that he himself hardly heard at all.
Twenty minutes later, as Potter lay in a stand of fragrant grass and hit the speed-dial button, it occurred to him that something was very wrong. That Handy was laying a trap.
He thought of Budd's words earlier in the day, about Handy's planning something clever and flamboyant – a breakout maybe, a run for it.