He saw Johnny Chow then, behind him. The man was standing on top of a car and screaming at the mob streaming past. One of the spotlights on a police car picked him up and held him steady in a bar of light. Chow kept waving his arms and haranguing and, gradually, the mob's flow began to slow. They were listening now. They had stopped running.
Tonaka, standing near the right fender of the car, was splashed by the spotlight. She was all in black, slacks, sweater, her hair done up in a kerchief. She stared up at the screeching Johnny Chow, her eyes narrowed, an odd composure about her, paying no heed to the crowd that jostled and pushed about the car.
It was impossible to hear what Johnny Chow was saying. His mouth opened and words came out and he kept pointing around him. But the mob had stopped running now. It began to thicken and clot. They were listening again. From the police lines came a shrilling of whistles and the line of cops began to fall back. A mistake, Nick thought. Should have kept them on the run. But the cops were far outnumbered and they were playing it safe.
He saw the men in the gas masks, at least a hundred of them. They swirled around the car where Chow was preaching and they all carried some sort of weapon — clubs, swords, guns and knives. Nick caught a flash of a Sten gun. This was the hard core, the real trouble-makers, and with the weapons and gas masks they meant to lead the mob through the police lines and into the Palace grounds.
Johnny Chow was still yelling and pointing toward the Palace. Tonaka watched from below, her face impassive. The men in gas masks began to form a crude front, shifting into ranks.
Killmaster glanced around. The jeep was caught in the press of the mob and he was looking over a sea of angry faces to where the spotlight still limned Johnny Chow. The police were showing restraint, but they were getting a good look at the bastard.
Nick eased the Browning out of his belt. He cast a glance down. No one in all the thousands was paying him the slightest attention. He was the invisible man. Johnny Chow was the cynosure. He was in the limelight at last. Killmaster smiled briefly. He would never get another chance like this.
It would have to be fast. This mob was capable of anything. They would tear him into bloody bits.
He guessed (he range at about thirty yards. Thirty yards with a strange gun he had never fired.
The police spotlight was still pinned on Johnny Chow. He wore it like a halo, unafraid, reveling in it, spitting and shouting out his hate. The ranks of armed and gas-masked men formed into a wedge and began to move toward the police lines.
Nick Carter brought the Browning up and leveled it. He took a quick deep breath, let half of it out, then pulled the trigger three times.
He could barely hear the shots over the mob's sound. He saw Johnny Chow spin atop the car, grab at his chest, then fall. Nick leaped from the jeep, as far out into the throng as he could push himself. He came down into a writhing mass of shoving bodies, struck out with his good hand, smashing a space clear, and began to work his way to the fringe of the mob. Only one man tried to stop him. Nick put an inch of hunting knife into him and kept going.
He had worked his way into the partial shelter of a hedge lining the beginning of Palace lawn when he caught 'the new note of the crowd. He crouched in the hedge, disheveled and bloody, and watched the mob charge the police again. The cadre of armed men was in the van, led by Tonaka. She waved a small Chinese flag — all her cover gone now — and she ran screaming at the head of the tattered, irregular wave of humanity.
A scatter of shots came from the police. No one fell. They were still firing high. The mob, again enthusiastic, mindless, came on behind the spearpoint of armed men, the hard core. The din was terrible and bloodthirsty, a manic giant screaming out his kill lust.
The thin line of police parted and the horsemen came out. Mounted police, at least two hundred of them, rode hard at the point of the mob. They were using sabers and they meant business. Police patience was at an end. Nick knew why — the Chinese flag had done it.
The horses smashed into the crowd. People reeled and went down. The screaming began. The sabers rose and fell, catching sparks from the spotlights and tossing them like bloody motes.
Nick was close enough to see it plainly. Tonaka turned and tried to run to one side to elude the charge. She tripped over a man already down. The horse reared and plunged, as frightened as the humans, nearly unseating its rider. Tonaka was halfway up, fleeing again, when the steel-shod hoof came down and pulped her skull.
Nick ran for the Palace wall that stood beyond the lawn fringed by the hedge. No time for the postern now. He looked like a bum, like a rioter himself, and they would never let him in.
The wall was ancient and mossy, covered with lichen and with plenty of finger and footholds. Even with one arm he had no difficulty getting over it. He dropped inside the grounds and ran toward a blaze of lights near the moat. There was a blacktop drive leading to one of the permanent bridges and a barricade had been set up. There were cars behind the barricade, people milling around and a low-keyed shouting of military and police voices.
A Japanese soldier stuck a carbine in his face.
"Tomodachi," Nick husked. "Tomodachi — friend! Take me to Commander-san. Hubba! Hayai!"
The soldier pointed to a knot of men near one of the cars. He prodded Nick toward them with the carbine. Killmaster thought: This is going to be the toughest part — looking the way I do. He probably wasn't speaking any too well, either. He was nervous, tense, beat up and damned near defeated. But he had to make them understand that the real trouble was only beginning. Somehow he had to do that…
The soldier said: "You put hands on head, please." He spoke to one of the men in the group. A half dozen curious faces turned Nick's way. He recognized one of them. Bill Talbot. Attaché at the Embassy. Thank God!
Nick had not known, until then, how much his voice had suffered from the beatings he'd taken. He was croaking like a raven.
"Bill! Bill Talbot. Come here. It's Carter. Nick Carter!"
The man came to him, slowly. There was no recognition in his stare.
"Who? Who are you, fella? How do you know my name?"
Nick fought for control. No use blowing his top now. He took a deep breath. "Just listen to me, Bill. Who will buy my lavender?"
The man's eyes narrowed. He came closer and peered at Nick. "Lavender is out this year," he said. "I want cockles and mussels. Sweet Jesus, is it really you, Nick?"
"It is. Now listen and don't interrupt. No time…"
He rattled out his story. The soldier had retired a few paces but he kept the carbine trained on Nick. The group of men by the car stared at them in silence.
Killmaster finished. "You take it now," he said. "Quick does it. Philston must be somewhere in the grounds."
Bill Talbot frowned at him. "You've been misinformed, Nick. The Emperor isn't here. Hasn't been for a week. He's in retreat. Meditating. Satori. He's at his private shrine near Fujiyoshida."
Richard Philston had duped them all.
Nick Carter swayed, then caught himself. You did what you had to do.
"Okay," he croaked. "Get me a fast car. Hubba! There might still be a chance. Fujiyoshida is only thirty miles and a plane is no good. I'll go ahead. You organize things here. They know you and they'll listen. Call Fujiyoshida and…"
"Can't. The lines are out. Damned near everything is out Nick, you look like a corpse — don't you think, that I had better…"
"I think you had better get me that car," Nick said grimly. "Right this goddamned minute."
Chapter 14
The big Embassy Lincoln bored through the night, heading southwest over a road that was good for short stretches, bad in most. When it was finished it would be a super-highway — now it was a mass of detours. He hit three before he was ten miles out of Tokyo.