Coffee (26 page)

“How
soon?”

“Before
day break. One of them’s asleep in our hospital right now,
and I’ll bet there’re more. I need someone there before
he makes his next move. This is big, Norris. Don’t make me
force this.”

Norris
grumbled as he finally straightened up in bed. “If you want
the best, that’s Jennie. She lives right here on campus.
She’ll cost you. It’s fifty for a kill, twenty five
guaranteed either way.”

Bart
grimaced. “Fifty? Sonya was only thirty five thousand, and
she had to go all the way to the mountains for three days!”

“You
said you want the best. You have to pay for it.”

“Christ,
Norris! How much of that goes into your pocket?”

“You’re
pissing me off. Take it or leave it. I’m going back to bed.”

“Ok
ok, it’s Global’s money.” He told him where to
find Warren, and passed on the second hand description. “He’s
got to be planning something around one of our employees, Harriet
Bishop, and may even think he can get her out. I have to know if
he’s alone and what is going on. We’ll bring him down
on breaking and entering through legal channels if possible, but if
anything goes wrong, have her give him the bug.”

- Chapter Seventeen -

Bryce
was barely able to pull the phone through the window opening. He
closed it down on the cord to block out the sound. After a last
check around, he dialed zero and listened.

A
thick Texan accented woman answered. “Operator, how may I help
you, please?”

Bryce
talked as loudly as he dared. “Can you connect me to Harriet
Bishop’s apartment?”

The
woman paused. Bryce risked that Etty was somewhere in these
apartments, a plausible assumption since she’d found her way
to a fax machine to call Knut.

“Harriet
Bishop? Ahh, who is this, please?”

“Bob
George - you know, room 121.” He knew damn well the lady
could tell where the call came from.

“Not
to be nosy or anything, but is this an emergency? It is, after all,
very early in the morning.”

“Oh,
she’s awake all right. I saw her a few minutes ago through
the window. I gotta personal question for her. Com’on, put me
through.”

“Could
you please hold?” It clicked and switched to Muzak. The
operator dialed the guards. “Security? There’s an
internal call request to Bishop’s apartment. She’s
marked as a ‘Watch’, so I called right away.”

“Who’s
calling?”

“Room
121. He’s a creep, I’ve heard about him. He’s
slimy, always bugging women. I think he’s been looking in her
windows. Can I tell him to screw off?”

The
two guards talked off line and then came back. “No, go ahead.
Let him through. She could use a little harassment. Record it, too
- Bart will love this.”

The
operator came back to Bryce. “I’ll put you through,
sir.”

‘Yes!’
Bryce cheered. Ringing. Fumbling sounds. “Hello?”

“Hi
Miss Bishop,” he said in a poorly delivered sexy sounding
voice. “I wanted to thank you for hanging your underwear in
the window like that.”

“Who
is this!”

“You
know, the guy from the lobby. I hang out with that friend of yours,
the one who keeps telling me how well you play darts.”

Etty
perked up. They’re here! She played along. “You can
see my underwear in the window?”

“Sure
can, nice bra. Big. I’d like to see what they carry around.”

“You
pervert! Buzz off! I’m drying it, OK! I can hang my stuff
anywhere I want. It’s none of your business! I’m
reporting you for peeping!” She slammed down the phone.
Bryce carefully opened the window and replaced the phone. Before
leaving, he took the pornographic magazine and put it in his pack,
thinking it might come in handy as a diversion.

Etty
sat up in bed and quickly reviewed the call. “Underwear in
the window. He must be trying to find out which room I’m in.
Not exactly the grand entrance I expected, but at least it’s
something.” She quickly threw on some clothes, and fished a
bra out of her drawer. She taped it in the middle of the picture
window in the living room. She left a light on so he could see it.
She opened the window as far as it would go, only a few inches, and
pushed a chair nearby so she could hear any noises coming from the
lawn below.

Bryce
continued to circle around to the north side, dashing among
obstacles to remain out of sight, reviewing the windows. He doubled
back to the south, and immediately spotted her room - three stories
up, one of the few lights on, and a brassiere hanging in full view.
Bryce tightened his boots, pocketed the glass cutter, and swung the
coiled rope over his shoulder. The black ribbed aluminum exterior
of the building, and wide sills on top and below each window,
offered ample foot holds for a trained climber. Within seconds he
ascended the wall and reached hers. Not wanting to hoist himself
into the light, he hung just below. “Psssst!”

“Where
are you?” she whispered back.

“Down
here. Take this rope and secure it someplace where it will hold my
weight.” He extended an end through the opening. While
holding it, she walked into one end of the kitchen and out the
other, making a huge loop.

“There,
that ought to do it,” she said as she tied a bowline. Bryce
pulled back the slack, careful not to let the excess dangle into the
window below. He coiled the remaining line, and fashioned a small
swing so he could sit a little more comfortably. Etty craned her
neck to see out the window and down but could only see the back of
his shirt. “Who are you?”

“Bryce
Applegate, FBI. Harriet Bishop, I presume?”

“Yup.
Where’s everyone else?”

“We
have to move fast, okay? I’ll tell you all about it in time,
but right now I’m worried about the sun coming up with me
swinging on a rope out your window. First turn off all the lights.
Turn on some music with a distinct beat - not loud enough to wake up
the place, but close. Then get pillows, quilts, anything soft you
can find and pile them up under your window.” Etty didn’t
question, and quickly attended to her tasks. She sprinted around
the apartment hitting every light switch. She put on a CD of the
Mambo Kings
. She stripped the bed of everything in a single
armful, and laid them out under the window.

“Ready,”
she said alertly on returning.

“I
need to get in. We have to cut a big enough hole for me to get
through without slicing my head off. Unfortunately, this is double
pane thermal glass, so that means you go first on your side, then
I’ll do this side.” Bryce handed a simple glass cutter
through the crack.

“I’ve
never used one of these before, give me a few pointers.” Etty
knew she and the man hanging from the rope were taking life
threatening risks. But the possibility of freedom made it easy to
accept. She willingly let the FBI man call the shots through this
delicate procedure.

Bryce’s
soft voice floated up through the cool dark air. “The art of
cutting glass is in a smooth, firm cut. Make an arching sweep, from
the sill, up about three feet, and curve back to the sill again,
making a cave-like opening with no sharp corners. You will have to
cut along the sill line as well. I’ll do the same on my side,
a little smaller, and I’ll push through from here.”

“Smooth
and firm. I can do that.”

“All
you are doing with the cutter is scoring the surface of the glass.
The other end of the cutter has a heavy metal ball on it.”

“Yes,
I see it.”

“You
use that to break the glass along your score line with tapping. You
don’t have to tap hard, you’ll see the little crack
follow along. Go to the music.”

“Got
it.” Etty made a mental line on the window where she would
cut. Then she walked to another window and tried a few test cuts to
get the feel.

While
Etty worked, Bryce’s voice returned. “It’s 6:00.
How were you planning on getting to the hospital?”

“Guard
escort.”

“I
was afraid of that. When do you expect him?”

“Him
or her, or maybe them. I said be here at 6:15. I thought you guys
were going to meet me
there
.”

“This
is safer. Hurry!”



“Hey
Betty, did you get a recording of the call?” asked the guard
just before he pushed the second half of a cupcake into his mouth.

“Yea,
what a loser. He was looking at her bra hanging in the window and
got hot. You boys ought to give him a little shake up, you know
what I mean?”

“What
did the girl say?” he said, muffled by a full mouth of food.

“Told
him to fuck off, said she would report him.”

“Oh
man, will Bart get a rise out of this. Put it on a cassette, will
you Betty? We’ll pick it up in a few minutes.”

“Whatever.”

“You’re
the greatest. I get a woody just thinking about you.”

Betty
disconnected quickly, mumbling into her headset, “Men are
pigs.”

The
guards exchanged a few words about Betty’s bust, and then the
chubby one stood. “Hey, we gotta do rounds soon anyway. Get
Henry in here to start his shift, and let’s take a quick look
at her bra in the window, wanna?”

“Yea,
get your binoculars, I’ll get the big flashlight.”

A
few minutes later, they stood on the south side of the Living
Quarters. One casually pissed in the grass while the other counted
the windows on the fourth floor with his fat fingers in the air.
“She’s in 424, that would be over from the left, one,
two, three...” The other finished up and turned on the
flood-light beam flashlight.

Bryce
heard the voices below. On a reflex, he cut the line with a pocket
knife and scampered down the wall. “Get back! Trouble!”
he whispered loudly, and then disappeared. Etty fell on her knees,
just as the bright light searched above her head. She flipped over
on her back onto the pillows, and watched the wide circle move from
window to window. Then it stopped, aimed squarely through one.
Etty tried to guess what they were seeing - thankfully it wasn’t
the window she’d been cutting. Then she noticed the shadow of
her bra clearly centered in the middle of the beam on the far wall.
“Amazing,” she said, shaking her head.

Bryce
dropped to the ground, and realized he had open space on either side
of him for 40 feet. No shrubs, no tall grass. If they shined their
lights down, there he’d be with his bag, big as life, like a
beached whale. His only chance was to sprint. He gripped the
ground ready to leap. But, to his amazement, the flashlight clicked
off. Bryce dropped face down alongside the building. Loud laughter
slowly faded as the two guards walked away. Bryce waited for a few
moments, and returned to her window with his bag.

“Harriet!”

“I’m
here.” She stood again at the window and started tapping along
the cut in the same tempo as the music.

“What
do you think?”

She
chuckled. “The bra. They came all the way out here to look
at the damn bra.”

“They
must have heard about it from my call. Could have been worse, it
means they don’t suspect anything.”

“Perversion
is a job requirement for the guards - doesn’t surprise me.”

Bryce
smiled, anxious to finally meet this woman. “How’s it
coming?”

“It’s
hard to see the crack in the dark, but I feel good about the cut.”

“Keep
going. 6:10 - Geez, only five minutes. Tap harder. Forget the
rope, I’m just going to hang on out here. I’ve got a
small ledge to stand on.”

Etty
quickly tapped all the way around, and then made the bottom cut.
She tapped again.

“That’s
enough. Hand me the cutter.”

“But
it’s not done, nothing fell through.”

“No,
it won’t until I push it.”

Someone
knocked loudly on the door.

“Damn!”
Bryce nearly shouted.

“He’s
early! What do I do?”

“You’re
going to have to detain him somehow, maybe knock him out.”

“Knock
him out? How the hell...”

More
loud knocking. Bryce pulled out the porno magazine and handed it to
her. “Give this to him, and hit him with something when he’s
reading it. I got it from your friend Bob in 121.”

Etty
neared panic. “Read a magazine? Where are all the rest of
you guys, anyway?”

“Hide
the rope. Then open the door. Stay calm.” He dared not lift
himself into the light, but he pressed his palm on the glass in her
view as a sign of support. “You can do it. I’ll be
right here if something goes wrong.”

“Some
comfort that is. What do I hit him with?”

More
aggressive knocking.

“Now,
Harriet. Think and act.”

She
made out the obscene photograph on the cover of the magazine -
another absurd dimension to the irrational scene. Etty gathered the
rope into a pile and threw it in a supply closet. Then she ran into
the kitchen to find a weapon. Bryce tried to create the scene from
what little he could hear.

“Wait
a minute! I’ll be right there!” she yelled to the door.

She
rifled the drawers. “Come on, come on! No rolling pin?
Don’t people use those anymore?” She found a drawer of
sharp knives - but pushed aside the horrid thought. On the counter
top, a cutting board - it’ll have to do!

She
carried it to the living room and propped it between the couch and a
sofa chair, then approached the door. “Here I am!” But
just about to turn the knob, she realized she was dressed and ready
to go - she needed him to read the magazine!

“I
mean... almost ready - just a sec!” She ran back into her
bathroom, yanked off her socks, jeans, and shirt. She tightly
wrapped a bathrobe around her and tied a small towel turban style in
her hair. Bare feet and calves showed below the robe. More banging
on the door.