Bolan stepped back and raised his sword.
The crowd rose to its feet.
The sword in Bolan's hand flew down, and in a silent ending to the day's butchery, the Lord of Life and Death, heroin king of Asia, was executed.
The exorcism was over. The most hideous experience of his incarnation as Colonel Phoenix was over for Mack Bolan.
He had been trapped in a purposeless knot, the struggle between life and death, when the real struggle, the war between good and evil, had been put aside by the maddening and miasmic pull of the Far East, a murderous place on a bad day....
He was purged now, and he would never allow such executions again. He had submitted to the ritual of death long enough. Now he prepared to face the future alone, to fight the good fight by fighting for the good, free of the corruption of others, of ancient societies and modern agencies.
Oh God, give me April, and home.
Chapter 14
In a flash Bolan was out of the ring and running, the crowd on his heels. It was an undignified exit, but this was no time to stand on ceremony. All the right spirit in the world will not stop a bullet, and many in the audience were armed.
Bolan headed for the mansion. It was his only hope. In the mansion were his clothes as well as his radio and gun. Without them he was lost. He knew where gun and radio were, having spotted them that morning.
He streaked through the palms, sword in hand, outdistancing his pursuers. The fear of a man pursued by a mob ready to tear him apart lent him wings. In their eyes Bolan had read the righteous rage of men deprived of a livelihood. By killing Liu he had put an end to Tiger Enterprises, and a lot of people would be out of work.
Paradoxically, it was the mob's hate that probably saved him. So intent were they on catching him alive, to make him suffer, that no one thought of shooting at him.
He ran into the mansion through the front entrance, sword ready to slash his way through. But the house was empty, as the guards and servants had been at the executions. He bounded up the main staircase.
On the second landing he turned into a corridor and ran past the changing room to the room with the radio and gun. The door was locked! He lunged at it, but it was useless. There was not enough space in the corridor to give him momentum. He tried kicking it down, but he only hurt his foot. A boot might have done it, but not a raffia sandal.
From the staircase came shouting as the mob poured into the house.
"This way!" said a woman's voice.
Bolan spun around. In an open doorway stood Liu's daughter. He ran inside, and she closed the door after him. It was a study full of medical books. She pulled him through it into a bedroom and opened a closet.
"In here!"
The door shut, plunging him into darkness. The only light came from the keyhole, and he noticed that there was no key. He crouched among clothes scented with her perfume, listening at the keyhole.
From the corridor came the sound of boots. Doors banged.
A knuckle rapped on the front door of her apartment, boots crossed the floor of the study, and a man's voice spoke apologetically. The monologue lasted for a minute, the boots retreated, the front door closed.
Bolan waited for word from her. But there was no sound. Had she left too? Then he heard it, a muffled sob.
Bolan emerged from the closet. She was sitting by the dresser, sobbing into her hands.
Bolan's insides tightened. Liu was evil, he had to die, but none of that changed the fact that a daughter had lost a father.
Bolan went up to her.
He stood in silence.
"I am sorry, but it had to be done," he said after a while.
She nodded and went on weeping quietly. He remained by her side, immobile, in a gesture of sympathy. In the corridor the sound of slamming doors receded.
Suddenly there was another rap on the front door.
Bolan moved back into the closet and again crouched by the keyhole, this time looking through.
A man in the uniform of a captain entered the bedroom. Bolan recognized him from the executions. The captain had killed a Montagnard by splitting him in two with one stroke, one of the few clean kills of the day.
"Ty Ling," the captain said. But she paid no attention.
The captain proceeded to speak. Bolan guessed he was presenting his condolences. When he finished he went up and put a hand on her shoulder.
Liu's daughter jumped and backed away, eyes flashing.
The captain resumed speaking. The tone was conciliatory. He held out his arms and moved toward her. She grabbed a candlestick and raised it threateningly. The man shrugged and left the room.
As the front door closed, she put the candlestick down and went into the study. Bolan heard the key turn in the front door lock. She returned and opened the closet.
"You can come out," she said. "They think you ran through the house. You are safe."
"Where is your bathroom?" he asked.
She indicated the door and he went inside. He washed his sword and dried it. When he came out she was standing by the window.
"Put it in the closet," she told him.
He put the sword away and turned to face her. "Why are you doing this?"
"I need your help," she replied, staring out. "I thought if I helped you, you might take me with you. I must get away from here."
"Why must you get away?" asked Bolan.
"So I can marry the man I love," she replied, still staring. "I am a doctor. Until a month ago I was working in a hospital in Mandalay. I met a man there, a German doctor. He was on an exchange. We fell in love, and he asked me to marry him. I came here to ask my father permission to marry. My father refused, told me I had to marry a Chinese, told me he had promised me in marriage to an officer, Weng Shi. He is the second man who came here. Now that my father is dead, Weng Shi will force me to marry him. You are my last chance."
''Are you a prisoner here?" asked Bolan.
She nodded. "The guards have orders not to allow me off the plantation. My father even refused to let me return to the hospital. He was afraid I would elope. When Gunther came here looking for me, my father told him I had left for America, that I had changed my mind." She paused to look at Bolan in a way that reminded him of Liu, that scrutinizing look. "Have you ever been in love?"
"Yes, I've been in love," said Bolan. "Where is it that you want to go, Mandalay?"
"Bangkok," she replied. "Or Rangoon. Gunther is back in Germany. I will take the first plane out. But you don't have to take me that far. I can take a train. I will not burden you, I promise. I am in good health and I can walk far. I can ride, too. I might even be useful to you. I know the trails around here."
"There's only one problem," said Bolan. "I'm not fleeing from marriage, but from people who want to skin me alive. If someone should try to stop me I'll shoot, no matter how many there are. And they'll shoot back. By coming with me you risk being killed."
"I'd rather be dead than spend the rest of my life with Weng Shi. I don't want him and I don't want this life. Hate, kill, hate, kill — that's all they know around here."
"So I've noticed."
"My father started it," she said with a sigh. "In the beginning it was a way of keeping them together, preventing the Ninety-third from disintegrating. The world was against them. To survive they had to hate back. Eventually it got into their blood; like a drug, they needed it to keep going. Ironic, isn't it? While poisoning the world with one drug they became addicts of another." She turned to took at Bolan. "If you wish I will pay you. I have money in Bangkok."