He raised his arm to protect himself, but the second Red Mask stabbed him in the elbow with one knife and the back of his gun hand with the other. Detective Kunzel felt warm wet blood spraying against his face.
He tried to fire again, but the knife that had gone through his elbow had cut his tendons. His fingers opened and the gun clattered onto the floor.
He was stabbed again and again, but he ignored the knives, even when they cut into his hands, and he pushed the second Red Mask away from him. The first Red Mask dodged from side to side, trying to block his way.
“Leaving us, Detective? So soon? And we were just beginning to enjoy ourselves!”
Detective Kunzel was stabbed in the back — once in the shoulder and once in the ribs. He dropped forward onto his knees, but before the second Red Mask could stab him again, he hunched his shoulders and lowered his head, and reared up from the floor with a bellow of rage and pain.
He collided with the first Red Mask, knocking him aside. Then he started to run across the parking level, in between the hanging bodies and the concrete pillars. He hadn’t run as fast as this for years, but he was damned if he was going to be stabbed to death and hung up from one of the sprinkler pipes.
He could hear himself panting, as if he were listening to somebody else who was running close behind him, and he could see droplets of blood flying in front of him with every step that he took.
My mother didn’t give birth to me to die like this. My father didn’t take me to baseball games to die like this. I didn’t go to the police academy to die like this. I’m going to die in my bed with my family all around me and the evening sun shining through the window.
He reached the door that led to the stairwell, and pulled it open. Looking back, he could see that the second Red Mask had stopped trying to chase him now, and was standing in between the suspended bodies of two SWAT officers, thirty yards away, both knives lowered, staring at him. His face shone in the midday sunlight like a red warning lamp.
He went through the door and the first Red Mask was standing there waiting for him, and he was holding a knife in each hand, too. Without any hesitation, he plunged them with a sharp chopping noise into Detective Kunzel’s stomach, cutting first one deep diagonal, upper left to lower right, and then another, upper right to lower left.
Detective Kunzel felt pain so intense that his whole body began to quake. Nothing could hurt this much. It just wasn’t possible. He stared at Red Mask, and tried to speak, but all that came out of his lips was a bubble of blood.
“Now that was the kind of sport I was looking for,” Red Mask whispered. “Entertainment and revenge, all in one. And a mystery, too. Am I one? Am I two? Maybe I’m neither. Maybe I’m both. So sad that you’ll never get to find out, Detective.”
He stepped away, sliding his knives back into his coat. Detective Kunzel staggered back against the wall. He stood there for a moment, his chest heaving. Then he tilted sideways and tumbled down the stairs, twenty of them, and lay in a bloodied heap on the landing below.
He wasn’t quite dead. He could see the light fitting on the ceiling above him. He could hear voices and the sound of people running. He thought of his mother, standing by the kitchen window. She was smiling at him and saying something that he couldn’t hear very distinctly.
It sounded like “Liebling.”
“Mom?” he croaked. “Mom, is that you?”
He heard a loud, resonating bang somewhere in the parking structure, but he had no way of knowing that it was the elevator dropping from the top floor down to the basement, with the remaining SWAT officers inside it.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Bad Day Dawning
Sissy opened her eyes. She was lying on top of her pink and green comforter, fully dressed except for her shoes. Frank was lying next to her with the covers over him, still sleeping.
She reached over and touched his hair, just to make sure that he was real. It was such a miracle to see him again that her eyes filled up with tears again, and she lay there for almost five minutes, stroking his shoulder, touching his ear.
She lifted her head a little and looked across at her bedside clock. It was nearly half past eleven. After Frank’s collapse, Sissy had insisted that he go to bed for a rest. He may not be the real Frank, only a likeness of Frank, but she still loved him, and she still wanted to take care of him.
There was a soft knock and then the bedroom door opened. It was Trevor, with Molly close behind him.
“How is he?” Trevor asked.
“He seems to be fine. He’s been sleeping.”
“We told Victoria.”
“How did she take it?”
“Pretty good, so far as we can tell. But you know what kids are like. As far as they’re concerned, anything’s possible until you can prove beyond doubt that it can’t be. I think she still believes in fairies. And remember what she said about giants.”
“Well, she may be right,” said Sissy, easing herself off the bed. “I’m seriously beginning to believe in giants myself. I can’t stop dreaming about them. Or at least this one particular giant.”
“Do you think that means anything, that dream?” Molly asked her.
Sissy looked down at Frank and couldn’t help smiling at him. “I don’t know. Probably not. Maybe I just need to believe in magic, too.”
Frank stirred and opened his eyes, and frowned at her.
“Frank? Good morning! How are you feeling?”
He blinked, and sat up. “Okay, I think. How long have I been asleep?”
“Are you hungry?” asked Molly.
“Sure. Yes. You don’t have any pancakes, do you?”
At that moment, Victoria came shyly into the bedroom and took hold of her mother’s hand, wearing jeans and a white embroidered blouse. She stood staring at Frank with a solemn expression on her face.
“Victoria,” said Trevor. “This is your grandpa. Are you going to say hi?”
Frank smiled at her. “Hi, Victoria. It’s a pleasure to meet you. You’re a very pretty girl, just like your momma.”
“Mommy says she painted you.”
“Yes, she did. And that’s why I’m here. I guess you could call it a kind of a miracle.”
“You’re not as old as Grandma.”
“No, I’m not, because this is what I looked like the last time that anybody saw me.”
Victoria approached a little closer. “You look real.”
“I feel real. I even feel hungry.”
He held out his hand. Victoria hesitated, and then she held it. She stared directly into his eyes, as if she were searching for some kind of sign that he was a trick or an optical illusion.
“Do you think God made you real?” she asked him.
“God? I don’t know, honey. All I can say is, that I’m deeply grateful. Even if I can’t stay for very long, at least I’ve had the chance to see my granddaughter, and my son, and your momma, too. And most of all I’ve had the chance to see my wife again.”
Sissy sat next to him at the kitchen table as he ate pancakes and syrup and two fried eggs, and drank three mugs of black coffee. Victoria sat opposite, staring at him in obvious fascination.
“Don’t stare, Victoria!” Molly scolded her.