«Hey, mon! Stop it! You own The Owl, I think not!»
«Get out of my way! Goddammit, take your hands off me!»
«With pleasure, mon!» The black man removed his hands from McAuliff’s coat, pulled back a tight fist, and hammered it into Alex’s stomach. The force of the blow, along with the shock of its utter surprise, caused McAuliff to double up.
He rose as fast as he could, the pain sharp, and lurched for the man. As he did so, the black man twisted his wrist somehow, and McAuliff fell into the surrounding, nearly oblivious, dancers. When he got to his feet, the attacker was gone.
It was a curious and very painful moment.
The smoke and its accompanying odors made him dizzy; then he understood. He was breathing deep breaths; he was out of breath. With less strength but no less intensity, he continued through the dancers to the narrow corridor.
It was a passageway to the rest rooms, «Chicks» to the right, «Roosters» to the left. At the end of the narrow hallway was a door with a very large lock, an outsized padlock, that was meant, apparently, to remind patrons that the door was no egress; The Owl of Saint George expected tabs to be paid before departure.
The lock had been pried open. Pried open and then reset in the round hasps, its curving steel arm a half inch from insertion.
McAuliff ripped it off and opened the door.
He walked out into a dark, very dark, alleyway filled with garbage cans and refuse. There was literally no light but the night sky, dulled by fog, and a minimum spill from the windows in the surrounding ghettolike apartment buildings. In front of him was a high brick wall; to the right the alley continued past other rear doorways, ending in a cul-de-sac formed by the sharply angled wall. To his left, there was a break between The Owl’s building and the brick; it was a passageway to the street. It was also lined with garbage cans, and the stench that had to accompany their presence.
McAuliff started down the cement corridor, the light from the streetlamps illuminating the narrow confines. He was within twenty feet of the pavement when he saw it. Them: small pools of deep red fluid.
He raced out into the street. The crowds were thinning out; Soho was approaching its own witching hour. Its business was inside now: the private clubs, the illegal all-night gambling houses, the profitable beds where sex was found in varying ways and prices. He looked up and down the sidewalk, trying to find a break in the patterns of human traffic: a resistance, an eruption.
There was none.
He stared down at the pavement; the rivulets of blood had been streaked and blotted by passing feet, the red drops stopping abruptly at the curb. Hammond had been taken away in an automobile.
Without warning, McAuliff felt the impact of lunging hands against his back. He had turned sideways at the last instant, his eyes drawn by the flickering of a neon light, and that small motion kept him from being hurled into the street. Instead, his attacker—a huge black man—plunged over the curb, into the path of an onrushing Bentley, traveling at extraordinary speed. McAuliff felt a stinging pain on his face. Then man and vehicle collided; the anguished scream was the scream at the moment of death; the screeching wheels signified the incredible to McAuliff. The Bentley raced forward, crushing its victim, and sped off. It reached the corner and whipped violently to the left, its tires spinning above the curb, whirring as they touched stone again, propelling the car out of sight. Pedestrians screamed, men ran, whores disappeared into the doorways, pimps gripped their pockets, and McAuliff stood above the bloody, mangled corpse in the street and knew it was meant to be him.
He ran down the Soho street; he did not know where, just away. Away from the gathering crowds on the pavement behind. There would be questions, witnesses … people placing him at the scene—involved, not placed, he reflected. He had no answers, and instinctively he knew he could not allow himself to be identified—not until he had some answers.
The dead black man was the one who had confronted him in The Owl of Saint George, of that he was certain: the man who had stunned him with a savage blow to the stomach on the dance floor and twisted his wrist, throwing him into the surrounding gyrating bodies. The man who had stopped him from reaching Hammond in the narrow corridor that led past the «Chicks» and the «Roosters» into the dark alleyway beyond.
Why had the black man stopped him? Why for Christ Almighty’s sake had he tried to kill him?
Where was Hammond?
He had to get to a telephone. He had to call Hammond’s number and speak to someone, anyone who could give him some answers.
Suddenly, Alex was aware that people in the street were staring at him. Why? Of course. He was running—well, walking too rapidly. A man walking rapidly at this hour on a misty Soho street was conspicuous. He couldn’t be conspicuous; he slowed his walk, his aimless walk, and aimlessly crossed unfamiliar streets.
Still they stared. He tried not to panic. What was it?
And then he knew. He could feel the warm blood trickling down his cheek. He remembered now: the sting on his face as the huge black hands went crashing past him over the curb. A ring perhaps. A fingernail … what difference? He had been cut, and he was bleeding. He reached into his coat pocket for a handkerchief. The whole side of his jacket had been ripped.
He had been too stunned to notice or feel the jacket ripping, or the blood.
Christ! What a sight! A man in a torn jacket with blood on his face, running away from a dead black man in Soho.
Dead? Deceased? Life spent?
No. Murdered.
But the method meant for him: a violent thrust into the street, timed to meet the heavy steel of an onrushing, racing Bentley.
In the middle of the next block—what block?—there was a telephone booth. An English telephone booth, wider and darker than its American cousin. He quickened his pace as he withdrew coins from his pocket. He went inside; it was dark, too dark. Why was it so dark? He took out his metal cigarette lighter, gripping it as though it were a handle that, if released, would send him plunging into an abyss. He pressed the lever, breathed deeply, and dialed by the light of the flame.
«We know what’s happened, Mr. McAuliff,» said the clipped, cool British voice. «Where precisely are you calling from?»
«I don’t know. I ran … I crossed a number of streets.»
«It’s urgent we know where you are. When you left The Owl, which way did you walk?»
«I ran, goddammit! I ran. Someone tried to kill me!»
«Which way did you run, Mr. McAuliff?»
«To the right … four or five blocks. Then right again; then left, I think two blocks later.»
«All right. Relax, now. You’re phoning from a call booth?»
«Yes. No, damn it, I’m calling from a phone booth!… Yes. For Christ’s sake, tell me what’s happening! There aren’t any street signs; I’m in the middle of the block.»
«Calm down, please.» The Englishman was maddening: imperviously condescending. «What are the structures outside the booth? Describe anything you like, anything that catches your eye.»
McAuliff complained about the fog and described as best he could the darkened shops and building. «Christ, that’s the best I can do. I’m going to get out of here. I’ll grab a taxi somehow; and then I want to see one of you! Where do I go?»
«You will not go anywhere, Mr. McAuliff!» The cold British tones were suddenly loud and harsh. «Stay right where you are. If there is a light in the booth, smash it. We know your position. We’ll pick you up in minutes.»