I awakened once before daylight and did not know where I was. It alarmed me. Then I remembered. And I remembered the way Gretel and I had talked about what to do on our first Christmas together. We had decided to take the Flush down to the lower end of Biscayne Bay and find a protected anchorage with maximum privacy and swim, and
The Green Ripper eat, and drink, and exchange Christmas greetings all day long.
No breakfast arrived. I pounded on the door and did some yelling. At about ten o'clock they unlocked the door and shoved Nicky in, with such force that he ran across the room and smacked the cement wall with his palms. He had a purple cheek, with the right eye swollen almost shut.
He sat in the chair and slumped over, staring at the floor.
"What's going on?" I asked him.
"Damn bastards are all uptight. Do it by the book. No variations permitted. According to them, I've tucked up twice in a row, which is twice too many times, but they won't even listen. One lousy weapon. One lousy Czech machine pistol, and I forgot to clean it after it was in the creek. For Chrissake, they've got a whole damn building full of weapons, grenades, plastique, nitro, napalm, and God only knows what else. One rotten pistol." He peered up at me with his good eye. "You tucked up too, eh? Or you wouldn't be locked in."
"I did? I don't know how. I got a little drunk."
"Percival doesn't think you're who you say you are, so they were going to give you some love-buzzing and open you up some, and then try some kind of Pentothal stuff he uses. You must have slipped up. Who the hell are you anyway?"
'`Thomas McGraw, dammit! Looking for my girl, dammit! Are you crazy or something? I like an your fAends. I don't know why they locked me up again. It don't make sense."
"You must have slipped up, or you wouldn't be here. That's all I know. Except I know I slipped up once too often. The way I am, when there's no action, I relax. I can't stay wound up all the time. These characters are gung-ho every minute. Like a bunch of cheerleaders. You like them, huh? Because they spent the evening liking you. That's the way it works. Barry, Sammy, and Ahman have had some action. Not much. Chicken-shit operations. Car bombs and burn-downs. In and out, like thieves. I had time in Nam, and then Zambia. We were in the hills near Refunsa. The way it worked, the Zambians would cross into Rhodesia and hit and run, and then suck the Rhodesian army units into Zambia, and we'd ambush them. Very tough people. Very tough country. I just can't stand waiting around so long with no action. I get sloppy. Persival says we don't move until maybe summer. Coordinated You never get to know much. You hear there are fifteen groups and then you hear forty. Who knows? When it comes time, we'll get the word from Sister Elena Marie."
4'Who?"
'4I forgot you don't know. The boss lady. They send out cassettes. I don't believe in a lot of this stuff, but I believe in her. I believe in her all the way." His voice and face were solemn.
There were questions I wanted to ask, but they
The Green Ripper were not questions Tom McGraw would have asked.
"Do you think this Sister Elena Marie would know where my little girl is?"
"I don't know. I don't even know if they've got any central records. I don't know where she is, even, where she makes the tapes. They say there were like three hundred of them here at one time, and this was a small retreat compared to the others. They moved them out to where they could help raise the money. Everybody has to do that. Your daughter had to do it too. Teams go up and down the streets, hitting every house. Sometimes you say it's for children, and sometimes for foreign missions. You sell stuff. Handicraft stuff. Also candy and artificial flowers and maybe fresh-baked bread. Once you catch on, it isn't hard. Four on our team, we'd raise two hundred, three hundred a day, every day. Ride around in the black vans with the crosses. Twenty cents' worth of junk candy for two dollars, to help the starving Christian children in Lebanon. You can claim one quarter of what your team raised when you have to stand up in the meeting and shout out what you turned in. They switch the teams around a lot. I'm so big people were always glad I was on their team. It's harder to say no to big people."
The door opened again. Four of them were there. Ahman and Sammy were in their coveralls, carrying the automatic weapons, left hands clamped on the forestock, right hands around the trigger assembly, long curved clips in place. Persival looked unlikely in an orange-yellow leisure suit and white turtleneck. Stone-faced, no-color, big-shouldered Author wore a wrinkled dark business suit, a white shirt with a frayed collar, and a narrow striped tie.
"Come along," Persival ordered. The four of them walked a dozen feet behind us. Persival told us where to go. We went to the place where the flats sloped down to the splintered trees, near the spot where I had found the cartridge case.
"Stop there," he said. "Move to your right two steps, McGraw. Now both of you turn slowly around and face me."
My heart gave an extra thump. Ahman and Sammy were aiming the weapons at us. Sammy was holding on Mck, and Ahman on me. Ahman's swarthy face and shiny black eyes revealed nothing. So maybe, when Persival had told somebody to check me out, they had checked more carefully than I had assumed they would, and found that Thomas McGraw had been dead for some time, and never had a daughter.
"What the hell is the matter with you people now?" I asked. I did not have to fake a definite quaver in my voice.
"You know, each of you, why you are dying today."
"Chicken shit," Nicky said in a husky voice.
'where can be no carelessness. None. Maximum
The Green Ripper precautions will be taken to prevent any premature disclosure. There will be no second chance for anyone whose actions could compromise us all. All orders will be obeyed, without question, without argument."
"Chicken shit," Nicky said again.
"Come here, Mr. McGraw," Persival said. "Over here. Stop there. Fine. Now turn and face the condemned." I was three feet from Persival, but I noted as I turned that Ahman's gun muzzle followed me like an empty steel eye socket.
Persival's voice deepened. "Dear God of wrath and mercy, take unto thy bosom this soldier of our faith and grant him eternal peace. We send him to thee now so that he will not further endanger the holy mission with which thou hast entrusted us, thy faithful soldiers in the army of justice. Amen.
His hand appeared in front of me, holding a slender automatic pistol with a long barrel. "Take it and shoot him in the head, please," Persival said. Same tone of voice as he would have said, "Have some more stew, please."
And the scenario was suddenly clear. I would shoot Mcky in the head with a blank, and my obedience would remove Persival's lingering suspicion of me, and Nicky would be frightened into being more careful next time. Two birds with one fake stone.
"It's ready to go," he said. "Just aim and fire."
There was no great need to aim. Nicky was per haps fifteen feet from me. If you aim a handgun with the same motion you use to point your finger at someone, if the barrel becomes your finger, you can hit a six-inch circle on the other side of the room ninety-nine out of a hundred times.