“No.”
“Fred...”
“I couldn’t put Jan through it again.” The marriage was barely intact as it was. “And Ronny. I’d have to tell him what we were doing and why.”
“He’s old enough to understand it.”
“He’d have to keep the secret for the rest of his life — or at least for the rest of mine. He’s too young for a responsibility like that.”
“You may not have a choice.”
“There’s always a choice,” he said with empty stubbornness.
“Like for instance?”
“Shouldn’t we wait and see what happens?”
“I want you to be prepared, Fred. It’s my job to protect you but I also kind of like you, you know. Most of the people we service are losers. Opportunists like Benson. Most of them are in the mob themselves. We nail them for something, then we offer them immunity if they’ll finger the higher-ups. Once in a while a guy like Benson accepts our offer and we go to work for him. But we don’t get too many good honest citizens who choose to testify because they see it as a moral duty. You were a breath of fresh air from the moment I met you. I don’t want anything to happen to you. We’ll send some good men to look after you. They’ll be there if you need them, you know, but they won’t get in your way. Where’d you like to go?”
Mathieson drummed his fingers on the table. “Hell. We’ve never been to Hawaii.”
“Sounds perfect, if you can swing the tab.”
“We’ve got high-priced clients nowadays. In fact we’re doing so well my partner wants to buy me out.”
“Does he. Well I hope it doesn’t come to that but you may have to accept his offer.”
“The hell. I just decided not to. This morning.”
“Did you tell your partner?”
“Not yet.”
“Then don’t. Tell him you want to get away for a couple of weeks to think it over.”
“It’s rough to get away right now, Glenn. I’m right in the middle of contract negotiations...”
“Nothing’s as urgent as survival.”
“Maybe. But I think you may be—”
The bartender yelled across the room: “Hey, everybody listen here!”
He was turning up the volume of the radio behind the bar. It was a news announcer’s voice:
“... promises to hold a news conference at nine tomorrow morning, Los Angeles time, at which time he expects to have been reunited with his son, Sam Stedman Junior. The star’s sixteen-year-old son, who was kidnapped last Saturday, is being taken by helicopter from his place of rescue in Baja California to a hospital in Hermosillo, Mexico. Mr. Stedman stressed that his son appears to be unharmed, according to his reports from private investigator Diego Vasquez, who rescued the youth this afternoon. But he said his son had been drugged with sedatives by the kidnappers to prevent his escaping. The flight to Hermosillo hospital is purely precautionary, Mr. Stedman said, and his son will be flown home to Los Angeles tonight in a private chartered plane which Mr. Stedman, a licensed pilot, will fly himself. On his way to Los Angeles airport, Mr. Stedman spoke briefly with this reporter.”
There was no mistaking the deep heartland twang of Sam Stedman’s voice. “Through the grace of God and the mercy of Jesus Christ my son has been set free. I’m clasping my hands in a prayer of profound thanks to Almighty God.”
“Mr. Stedman, is it true that your son was rescued by an armed assault on the kidnappers’ camp by Mr. Vasquez?”
“Yes, sir, it was Diego Vasquez’s show, pure and simple. My son and I owe a great deal to that fine man — more than we can ever repay. I pray to God to bestow His blessing on Mr. Vasquez and his fine family.”
“We’ve heard reports that three or four of the kidnappers may have been shot during the rescue operation. Can you confirm that, sir?”
“No, I can’t. I think we’d just better wait and find out the truth from the people who are actually down there. You have to excuse me now. Bless you.”
The bartender turned the radio down and beamed at everyone in the room. “Well now how about that, folks?”
The fat actor lurched to the door. He looked around owlishly. “Hallelujah,” he muttered, and went.
Conversations picked up again. The waitress plugged the jukebox back in. Bradleigh seemed annoyed: “Vasquez. I’m sick of hearing Vasquez, Vasquez, Vasquez. You’d think he was Emiliano Zapata. Fucking gunslinger. He’s found a way to commit legal murder and the press loves the son of a bitch. In a sane society he’d be locked up in a rubber room.”
Bradleigh lit another cigarette and inhaled ferociously. “They say he gets the job done. Well the bastard that tried to murder Benson in Oklahoma — he almost got the job done too. Where’s the difference? Come on, let’s get out of here.” He signaled for the check.
Mathieson said, “Where can I reach you?”
“Right behind you. I’ll tag along in my car and hang around until we’ve got you packed and on the plane.”
7
Going up toward the top of the canyon drive he heard sirens somewhere nearby. There were always sirens in the valley; the sound carried up the gorges.
He saw the blue Plymouth in the rearview mirror, Bradleigh’s left hand propping up the frame of the open window.
By habit he had the car radio tuned to KGEB, the all-news station; a fraction of his attention absorbed the Stedman-Vasquez story and the hour’s catalog of disasters while he stopped and waited for a Datsun to back out of a driveway. He was starting to move again when his ear picked up the name Mathieson; he shot his hand to the radio knob to turn it up.
“... explosion evidently was caused by a powerful bomb that was thrown from a passing car. The bomb was hurled into the house through a front window, shattering the glass and exploding violently inside the living room. Jim Schott reported from the scene of the explosion a few minutes ago that police and rescue workers still are not certain whether the Mathieson residence was occupied at the time of the blast. Firemen and police are sifting the wreckage...”
He was jammed up behind the lackadaisical Datsun with traffic flicking past in the opposite lane; he held the horn down and hooted the Datsun right off the road and went up to the crest ramming the gearshift around, swinging the Porsche fast through the bends, squealing. In the mirror Bradleigh’s Plymouth was lodged behind the Datsun, dwindling.
At the top he squirted recklessly across the stop-sign intersection; down the turns on the north slope he rode the brake, teetering around the sharp curves, hunched forward over the wheel.
He heard the grind of a siren starting up. One last bend and then he swerved through it, nearly banging nose to windshield as he tried to see ahead.
Maddeningly his view was blocked by a great red fire truck that was beginning to pull away. He slewed toward the curb behind it.
A cop ran forward, gesturing at him angrily. The lawn was aswarm with men in uniform. Three patrol cruisers were drawn up at haphazard angles, askew on the road. He saw the Gilfillans and Jan, standing in a rigid little knot like mannequins: Jan was pale, she had both fists clenched at her sides, she wasn’t looking at the man in the business suit who was talking to her with a notebook in his hand.
“Get back in that car and move along out of here, buddy.”
He was searching for Ronny; he still had his hand on the car door and he felt the Porsche begin to roll — he hadn’t pulled the brake. He dived back into the seat, stabbing for the pedal. That was when something made a loud sharp crack over his shoulder.