The Cry of the Halidon: A Novel

  “Just like that?” asked McAuliff apprehensively. “Suppose he pulls a gun?”

  “I’ll be beside you. He won’t have time.”

  And the Corsican did not.

  As Hammond predicted, the man under the sign spoke into the radio. The agent and Alex were beneath the low awning on the street, concealed by the crowds. The second the Corsican’s arm began to descend from the side of his head, Hammond jabbed McAuliff’s ribs. The two men broke through the flow of people toward the professional killer.

  Alexander reached him first; the man started. His right hand went for his belt, his left automatically raised the radio. McAuliff grabbed the Corsican’s wrist and threw his shoulder into the man’s chest, slamming him against the pole supporting the sign.

  Then the Coriscan’s whole face contorted spastically; a barking, horrible sound emerged from his twisted mouth. And McAuliff felt a burst of warm blood exploding below.

  He looked down. Hammond’s hand held a long switchblade. The agent had ripped the Corsican’s stomach open from pelvis to rib cage, severing the belt, cutting the cloth of the brown gabardine suit.

  “Get the radio!” commanded the agent. “Run south on the east side of the street. I’ll meet you at the next corner. Quickly now!”

  Alex’s shock was so profound that he obeyed without thought. He grabbed the radio from the dead hand and plunged into the crowds crossing the intersection. Only when he was halfway across did he realize what Hammond was doing: he was holding up the dead Coriscan against the pole. He was giving him time to get away!

  Suddenly he heard the first screams behind him. Then a mounting crescendo of screams and shrieks and bellowing roars of horror. And within the pandemonium, there was the piercing shrill of a whistle … then more whistles, then the thunder of bodies running in the steaming-hot street.

  McAuliff raced … was he running south? Was he on the east side? He could not think. He could only feel the panic. And the blood. The blood! The goddamn blood was all over him! People had to see that!

  He passed an outdoor restaurant, a sidewalk café. The diners were all rising from their seats, looking north toward the panicked crowds and the screams and the whistles … and now the sirens. There was an empty table by a row of planter boxes. On the table was the traditional red-checked tablecloth beneath a sugar bowl and shakers of salt and pepper.

  He reached over the flowers and yanked the cloth, sending the condiments crashing to the cement deck, one or all smashing to pieces; he did not, could not, tell. His only thought was to cover the goddamn blood, now saturated through his shirt and trousers.

  The corner was thirty feet away. What the hell was he supposed to do? Suppose Hammond had not gotten away? Was he supposed to stand there with the goddamn tablecloth over his front looking like an imbecile while the streets were in chaos?

  “Quickly now!” came the words.

  McAuliff turned, grateful beyond his imagination. Hammond was directly behind him, and Alex could not but help notice his hands. They were deep red and shining; the explosion of Corsican blood had left its mark.

  The intersecting street was wider; the sign read QUEEN’S DRIVE. It curved upward toward the west, and Alex thought he recognized the section. On the diagonal corner an automobile pulled to a stop; the driver peered out the window, looking north at the racing people and the sounds of a riot.

  Alex had to raise his voice to be heard. “Over there!” he said to Hammond. “That car!”

  The Englishman nodded in agreement.

  They dashed across the street. McAuliff by now had his wallet out of his pocket, removing bills. He approached the driver—a middle-aged black Jamaican—and spoke rapidly.

  “We need a ride. I’ll pay you whatever you want!”

  But the Jamaican just stared at Alexander, his eyes betraying his sudden fear. And then McAuliff saw: The tablecloth was under his arm—how did it get under his arm?—and the huge stain of dark red blood was everywhere.

  The driver reached for the gearshift; Alex thrust his right hand through the window and grabbed the man’s shoulder, pulling his arm away from the dashboard. He threw his wallet to Hammond, unlatched the door, and yanked the man out of the seat. The Jamaican yelled and screamed for help. McAuliff took the bills in his hand and dropped them on the curb as he pummeled the driver across the sidewalk.

  A dozen pedestrians looked on, and most ran, preferring noninvolvement; others watched, fascinated by what they saw. Two white teenagers ran toward the money and bent down to pick it up.

  McAuliff did not know why, but that bothered him. He took the necessary three steps and lashed his foot out, smashing one of the young men in the side of the head.

  “Get the hell out of here!” he roared as the teenager fell back, blood matted instantly along his blond hairline.

  “McAuliff!” yelled Hammond, racing around the car toward the opposite front door. “Get in and drive, for God’s sake!”

  As Alex climbed into the seat, he saw what he knew instantly was the worst sight he could see at that moment. A block away, from out of the milling crowds on the street, a tan Mercedes-Benz had suddenly accelerated, its powerful, deep-throated engine signifying its anticipated burst of speed.

  McAuliff pulled the gearshift into drive and pressed the pedal to the floor. The car responded, and Alex was grateful for the surge of the racing wheels. He steered into the middle of Queen’s Drive, on what had to be Miranda Hill, and immediately passed two cars … dangerously close, nearly colliding.

  “The Mercedes was coming down the street,” he said to Hammond. “I don’t know if they spotted us.”

  The Britisher whipped around in the seat, simultaneously withdrawing the Rycee automatic and the transistorized radio from both pockets. He snapped on the radio; the static was interspersed with agitated voices issuing commands and answering excitedly phrased questions.

  The language, however, was not English.

  Hammond supplied the reason. “Dunstone has half the Unio Corso in Jamaica.”

  “Can you understand?”

  “Sufficiently … They’re at the corner of Queen’s Drive and Essex. In the Miranda Hill district. They’ve ascertained that the secondary commotion was us.”

  “Translated: they’ve spotted us.”

  “Can this car get a full throttle?”

  “It’s not bad; no match for a Mercedes, though.”

  Hammond kept the radio at full volume, his eyes still on the rear window. There was a burst of chatter from the tiny speaker, and at the same instant McAuliff saw a speeding black Pontiac come over the incline in front of him, on the right, its brakes screeching, the driver spinning the wheel. “Jesus!” he yelled.

  “It’s theirs!” cried Hammond. “Their west patrol just reported seeing us. Turn! The first chance you get.”

  Alex sped to the top of the hill. “What’s he doing?” He yelled again, his concentration on the road in front, on whatever automobile might lie over the crest.

  “He’s turning … side-slipped halfway down. He’s righting it now.”

  At the top of the incline, McAuliff spun the wheel to the right, pressed the accelerator to the floor, and raced past three automobiles on the steep descent, forcing a single approaching car to crowd the curb. “There’s some kind of park about a half a mile down.” He couldn’t be sure of the distance; the blinding sun was careening off a thousand metal objects … or so it seemed. But he couldn’t think of that; he could only squint. His mind was furiously abstracting flashes of recent memory. Flashes of another park … in Kingston; St. George’s. And another driver … a versatile Jamaican named Rodney.

  “So?” Hammond was bracing himself now, his right hand, pistol firmly gripped against the dashboard, the radio, at full volume, against the seat.

  “There’s not much traffic. Not too many people either …” Alex swerved the car once again to pass another automobile. He looked in the rearview mirror. The black Pontiac was at the top of the hill behind them; ther
e were now four cars between them.

  “The Mercedes is heading west on Gloucester,” said Hammond, breaking in on Alex’s thoughts. “They said Gloucester … Another car is to proceed along … Sewell …” Hammond translated as rapidly as the voices spoke, overlapping each other.

  “Sewell’s on the other side of the district,” said McAuliff, as much to himself as to the agent. “Gloucester’s the shore road.”

  “They’ve alerted two vehicles. One at North and Fort Streets, the other at Union.”

  “That’s Montego proper. The business area. They’re trying to cut us off at all points. For Christ’s sake, there is nothing else left!”

  “What are you talking about?” Hammond had to shout; the screaming tires, the wind, the roaring engine did not permit less.

  Explanations took time, if only seconds—there were no seconds left. There would be no explanations, only commands … as there had been commands years ago. Issued in the frozen hills with no more confidence than McAuliff felt now.

  “Get in the backseat,” he ordered, firmly but not tensely. “Smash the rear window; get yourself a clear area. When I swing into the park, he’ll follow. As soon as I’m inside, I’m going to swerve right and stop. Hard! Start firing the second you see the Pontiac behind us. Do you have extra clips?”

  “Yes.”

  “Put in a full one. You’ve used two shells. Forget that goddamn silencer, it’ll throw you off. Try to get clean shots. Through the front and side windows. Stay away from the gas tank and the tires.”

  The stone gates to the park were less than a hundred yards away, seconds away. Hammond stared at Alex—for but an instant—and began climbing over the seat to the rear of the automobile.

  “You think we can switch cars—”

  Perhaps it was a question; McAuliff did not care. He interrupted. “I don’t know. I just know we can’t use this one any longer and we have to get to the other side of Montego.”

  “They’ll surely spot their own vehicle.”

  “They won’t be looking for it. Not for the next ten minutes … if you can aim straight.”

  The gates were on the left now. Alex whipped the steering wheel around; the car skidded violently as Hammond began smashing the glass in the rear window. The automobile behind swerved to the right to avoid a collision, its horn blaring, the driver screaming. McAuliff sped through the gate, now holding down the bar of his horn as a warning.

  Inside the gates he slammed on the brakes, spun the wheel to the right, pressed the accelerator, and jumped the curb of the drive over onto the grass. He crashed his foot once again onto the brake pedal; the car jolted to a stop on the soft turf. In the distance strollers in the park turned; a couple picknicking stood up.

  Alex was not concerned. In seconds the firing would start; the pedestrians would run for cover, out of the danger zone. Away from the fire base.

  Danger zone. Fire base. Cover. Terms from centuries ago.

  So then it followed that the strollers were not pedestrians. Not pedestrians at all.

  They were civilians.

  It was war.

  Whether the civilians knew it or not.

  There was the sudden, ear-shattering screech of tires.

  Hammond fired through the smashed rear window. The Pontiac swerved off the drive, hurtled over the opposite curb, careened off a cluster of tropic shrubbery, and slammed into a mound of loose earth dug for one of a thousand unending park projects. The engine continued at high speed, but the gears had locked, the wheels still, the horn blasting in counterpoint to the whining roar of the motor.

  Screams could be heard in the distance.

  From the civilians.

  McAuliff and Hammond jumped out of the car and raced over grass and concrete onto grass again. Both had their weapons drawn; it was not necessary. R. C. Hammond had performed immaculately. He had fired with devastating control through the open side window of the Pontiac. The automobile was untouched but the driver was dead, sprawled over the wheel. Dead weight against the horn.

  The two fugitives divided at the car, each to a door of the front seat, Alexander on the driver’s side. Together they shoved the lifeless body away from the wheel; the blaring horn ceased, the engine continued to roar. McAuliff reached in and turned the ignition key.

  The silence was incredible.

  Yet, still, there were the screams from the distance, from the grass.

  The civilians.

  They yanked at the dead man and threw the body over the plastic seat onto the floor behind. Hammond picked up the transistor radio. It was in the “on” position. He turned it off. Alexander got behind the wheel and feverishly tugged at the gearshift.

  It did not move, and the muscles in McAuliff’s stomach tensed; he felt his hands trembling.

  From out of a boyhood past, long, long, forgotten, came the recall. There was an old car in an old garage; the gears were always sticking.

  Start the motor for only an instant.

  Off-on. Off-on.

  Until the gear teeth unlocked.

  He did so. How many times, he would never remember. He would only remember the cold, calm eyes of R. C. Hammond watching him.

  The Pontiac lurched. First into the mound of earth; then, as Alex jammed the stick into R, backward—wheels spinning furiously—over the grass.

  They were mobile.

  McAuliff whipped the steering wheel into a full circle, pointing the car toward the cement drive. He pressed the accelerator, and the Pontiac gathered speed on the soft grass in preparation for its jarring leap over the curb.

  Four seconds later they sped through the stone gates.

  And Alexander turned right. East. Back toward Miranda Hill.

  He knew Hammond was stunned; that did not matter. There was still no time for explanations, and the Englishman seemed to understand. He said nothing.

  Several minutes later, at the first intersecting road, McAuliff jumped the light and swung left. North. The sign read CORNICHE ANNEX.

  Hammond spoke.

  “You’re heading toward the shore road?”

  “Yes. It’s called Gloucester. It goes through Montego and becomes Route One.”

  “So you’re behind the Dunstone car … the Mercedes.”

  “Yes.”

  “And may I presume that since the last word”—here Hammond held up the walkie-talkie—“any of them received was from that park, there’s a more direct way back to it? A faster way?”

  “Yes. Two. Queen’s Drive and Corniche Road. They branch off from Gloucester.”

  “Which, of course, would be the routes they would take.”

  “They’d better.”

  “And naturally, they would search the park.”

  “I hope so.”

  R. C. Hammond pressed back into the seat. It was a gesture of temporary relaxation. Not without a certain trace of admiration.

  “You’re a very apt student, Mr. McAuliff.”

  “To repeat myself, it’s a rotten school,” said Alexander.

  They waited in the darkness, in the overgrowth at the edge of the field. The crickets hammered out the passing seconds. They had left the Pontiac miles away on a deserted back road in Catherine Mount and walked to the farm on the outskirts of Drax Hall, where they found a stream and cleaned themselves up, washing the blood off their skin and soaking their clothes. They had waited until nightfall before making the last few miles of the trip. Cautiously, shelter to shelter; when on the road, as far out of sight as possible. Finally using the tracks of the Jamaica Railway as their guideline.

  There had been a road map in the glove compartment of the automobile, and they studied it. It was maddening. Most of the streets west of Montego proper were unmarked, lines without names, and always there were the alleys without lines. They passed through a number of ghetto settlements, aware that the inhabitants had to be sizing them up—two white men without conceivable business in the area. There was profit in an assault on such men.

  Hammond had i
nsisted that they both carry their jackets, their weapons very much in evidence in their belts.

  Subalterns crossing through hostile colonial territory, letting the wog natives know they carried the magic firesticks that spat death.

  Ludicrous.

  But there was no assault.

  They crossed the Montego River at Westgate; a half mile away were the railroad tracks. They ran into an itinerant tramp enclave—a hobo camp, Jamaica-style—and Hammond did the talking.

  The Englishman said they were insurance inspectors for the company; they had no objections to the filthy campsite so long as there was no interference with the line. But should there be interference, the penalties would be stiff indeed.

  Ludicrous.

  Yet no one bothered them, although the surrounding black eyes were filled with hatred.

  There was a freight pickup at Drax Hall. A single platform with two wire-encased light bulbs illuminating the barren site. Inside the weather-beaten rain shelter was an old man drunk on cheap rum. Painstakingly they elicited enough information from him for McAuliff to get his bearings. Vague, to be sure, but enough to determine the related distances from the highway, which veered inland at Parish Wharf, to the farm district in the southwest section.

  By 9:30 they had reached the field.

  Now, Alex looked at his watch. It was 10:30.

  He was not sure he had made the right decision. He was only sure that he could not think of any other. He had recalled the lone farmhouse on the property, remembered seeing a light on inside. There was no light now. It was deserted.

  There was nothing else to do but wait.

  An hour passed, and the only sounds were those of the Jamaican night: the predators foraging, victims taken, unending struggles—immaterial to all but the combatants.

  It was nearly the end of the second hour when they heard it.

  Another sound.

  An automobile. Driving slowly, its low-geared, muted engine signaling its apprehension. An intruder very much aware of its transgression.

  Minutes later, in the dim light of a moon sheeted with clouds, they watched a long figure run across the field, first to the north end, where a single torch was ignited, then to the south—perhaps four hundred yards—where the action was repeated. Then the figure dashed once more to the opposite end.