Death Through the Looking Glass (20 page)

“Are you sure there's nothing I can do?”

“No, thanks,” she replied absently and handed him a drink. “He had been in New York.”

“Really?”

“He had a bunch of receipts and invoices that he pulled from his pocket and stuffed into the dresser.”

“Receipts for what?”

“I don't know.” She felt a chill and looked across the room toward the man looking at her with the level gaze. She slowly placed her drink on the counter. “Liquor doesn't seem to help. I think maybe I'll take a tranquilizer. Will you excuse me?”

“Of course.”

“I'll be right back.”

As Bea disappeared up the stairwell, Damon Snow took the automatic from his pocket and began to screw the silencer to the barrel.

Rocco had managed to sit up, with his back wedged against the side of the basket. “How are your legs?” Lyon asked.

“Could be a lot worse. He got me in the thigh and calf, but the bleeding's slowed, so he must have missed the arteries. Right now, I've got the feeling that my wounds are the least of our worries. What's going to happen?”

Lyon looked out over the edge of the basket. To the left and behind were the Race, Fisher's Island, and the distant shore of Connecticut. They had passed Montauk Point, on the right. Open sea lay ahead. “We'll go down when the propane runs out.”

“Into the water?”

“I'm afraid so.” They were still on the rising edge of the parabolic curve that was taking them higher into the atmosphere and farther out over the water. Lyon knew that the altitude record for a hot-air balloon was 86,000 feet, but that had been in an enclosed gondola with life-support systems. He didn't inform Rocco that once they reached 18,000 feet they would begin to feel the effects of oxygen deprivation and would start to die of hypoxia.

In the distance was the low outline of Block Island, their last landfall.

He looked up into the envelope to see the panel lines flapping uselessly. The cut lines were too deep within the bag for his handcuffed hands to possibly reach, even if he did manage to balance on the rim of the basket. Their trajectory still carried them toward Block Island. If the wind remained constant, without diverting puffs, they would pass over the northerly spit of land at the island's apex.

His mind sought frantically for the temperature and descent formulas so carefully learned years ago in ground school and almost as quickly forgotten. He slid down in the basket with his feet next to Rocco's. Lyon could figure the temperature inside the envelope, and he knew that the seventy-five degree ground temperature had fallen three degrees for every thousand feet of altitude … he must convert those Fahrenheit temperatures to Kelvin and try to calculate the air pressure and its effect on the balloon circumference.

“For Christ's sake, Lyon, don't conk out on me now!”

Lyon shook his head vehemently and closed his eyes. There were so many variables, and it was almost impossible to work out the equations accurately in his head. He lay back against the wicker and cleared his mind of everything but the applicable data.

Lyon blinked his eyes open to face a frightened Rocco. He struggled to his feet to look at the small finger of land still in the balloon's path. “We can make it to Block Island if we can manipulate the burner.”

“How?”

“Can you get into a squatting position?”

“I don't know.”

“If you can, and if I throw my legs over your shoulders while you stand … I may be able to reach the rope around the burner lever.”

“It's worth a try.” With a grimace of pain, Rocco drew his leg up and shoved himself forward until he was kneeling on the swaying basket floor. Lyon swung his legs over Rocco's shoulders and tucked his feet under.

“Can you stand?”

“I've got to.” Rocco placed one foot flat on the floor and involuntarily let out a groan of pain. His body wavered for a moment, and then the other leg went forward until he was bent forward in deep-knee-bend position, with Lyon swaying on his shoulders. “Here we go!”

Their bodies leaned from one side to the other on the unstable platform as Rocco slowly rose. Lyon pulled his cuffed hands up as far as he could. His fingers searched for the rope tying the lever.

“Oh, Jesus!” Rocco said as his right leg splayed to the side and both men crashed down against the side of the basket. “I can't do it, Lyon. My legs won't hold up.”

Time was running out. The propane had to be adjusted immediately in order for the balloon to have a gradual, constant descent toward the spit of land that was less than a quarter of a mile in width. A miss of a hundred yards in either direction would mean drowning. Lyon wondered briefly how long he could tread water if he was able to escape the confines of the collapsing envelope, but he knew that Rocco, with his injured legs, would be completely helpless.

Rocco turned his head toward the propane tank. “Why don't you just turn the thing off from here?”

“Damon knocked off the valve.”

“Pull out the connecting hose so the damn thing won't feed fuel.”

Lyon shook his head. “There's too much pressure in the tank. If we pull out the hose, the propane will blow up toward the burner and we'll turn into a fireball.”

“Then don't let it all out.”

Lyon nodded his head. “It might work.” He hunched across the basket toward the tank and sat on its edge, with his hands behind him around the connecting hose. His fingers fumbled at the holding brackets at the base of the tank and gradually worked them loose. The hose broke free from the tank, and a short gasp of propane rushed past Lyon's neck before he jammed a finger in the aperture.

Over their heads, a burst of flame broke around the burner. “Is the pilot light out?” Lyon yelled.

“I don't think so.”

As the air in the bag cooled, they began to drop. When the rate of descent increased, Lyon fumbled for the loose end of the connecting hose and awkwardly worked it over the nipple. The burner burst into a long streak of flame. He left the hose attached for a count of five and then jerked it away from the tank and covered the opening.

The balloon began a stepped approach toward the island, until at 1,200 feet the propane gave out. They began to drift rapidly and noiselessly downward.

As they passed over the leading edge of the island at a hundred feet, a small boy walking the water's edge looked up and waved.

“How are we doing?” Rocco asked from the floor of the basket.

“We're not going to make it,” Lyon replied. “We're still at 80 feet, and we're now approaching the far end of the island. I think we'll touch down on the other side—in the water.”

“In the water, you said?”

“Yes.”

“I could sum this up in one word.”

Lyon looked toward the horizon to see only open sea as they passed over the island. The basket skimmed the water. “If we can stay afloat for a few minutes, someone may come out with a boat.”

“Do the best you can. I'll float like a rock,” Rocco said as he struggled to his feet.

Lyon looked at his friend with compassion as the forward edge of the basket skipped along the waves and settled into the water. Their combined weight pushed the gondola under. The bag slowly began to fall sideways as the last of the heated air cooled and seeped from the aperture of the envelope.

They stood in the sunken gondola under the warm morning sun as the basket settled to the bottom and water lapped at their waists. “Tide's out,” Lyon said in a faraway voice.

Rocco threw back his head and began to laugh. The sound spewed out in a choking gurgle that took on body and rolled out over the water. Lyon joined in, and waves of mirth convulsed them both.

Bea took the receipts from the drawer where Lyon had wadded them and spread them along the top of the bureau. He had purchased a hodgepodge of items: electronic parts, toy airplanes, chemicals. What did they add up to?

“Find anything?” Snow asked from the doorway.

She turned. “Damon! You startled me.”

“Can you make anything out of what he left?”

“It doesn't make any sense.” Things nibbled at the corner of her mind, and she hastily stuffed the receipts into her slacks as Damon watched her with searching eyes. “Come on, let's finish that drink.”

He followed her downstairs. “Perhaps I should look them over.”

She waved to him nonchalantly. “I don't think I want to fool with it now.” In the kitchen she freshened their untouched drinks. “Do you remember the name of that girl who had identification in the Giles plane? The one who didn't exist?”

“Carol Dodgson.”

“Yes, that's what I thought it was.” She was immediately sorry she had asked. Damon sat on a kitchen stool and watched her speculatively, as if waiting for her to proceed. What had Lyon said as he tossed in his sleep? “Through the looking glass.” Carol Dodgson … Carol through the looking glass. Charles Dodgson, Lewis Carroll's real name. Lyon had also told her about the first interview in Damon's office, with dozens of Alice dolls posed around the room. And Damon knew how to fly. The receipts had something to do with airplanes, radios, perhaps something that was radio-controlled. If anything happened to Lyon, the list could be duplicated. She could go back to the stores and purchase the same items, and that would reveal what Lyon had discovered on his abortive last flight.

“A penny for your thoughts.”

“I'm just worried sick about Rocco and Lyon.”

“I'm sure there'll be word soon. This waiting is nerve-wracking. Let me see those papers; perhaps I can make something out of them.”

“I really don't care to go into that now.”

Damon walked to her and reached toward her pocket. “I said, let me see them.”

“Damon, please!”

He extracted the papers from her pocket and retreated across the room. Bea felt cold, very cold, and hugged her body with both arms.

The Coast Guard helicopter made a deep bank over Lantern City Point. Lyon braced himself against the vibrating airframe and looked out the window toward Damon Snow's summerhouse below.

“Can you see anything?” Rocco called from his stretcher on the floor.

“The pickup's still there, and your car, but Damon's is gone.”

“We'll get the bastard. He has no way of knowing we've been picked up, and he won't be running.”

“But Bea called the Coast Guard,” Lyon said, his voice lost in the din of the engines. “He must be with her.” He beckoned to a crewman for his headset and mike. “This is Wentworth,” he said to the pilot. “It's extremely important that you take a heading over Murphysville.”

“What's up?” Rocco yelled.

“I think he might be with Bea. We can tell when we fly over the house.”

“Tell him to land on the Murphysville green. I can pick up some men. And under no circumstances is anyone to contact Bea.”

Lyon nodded and stared numbly out the window as the helicopter followed the path of the Connecticut River toward Murphysville.

Damon glanced through the bills and invoices, wadded them into small balls and placed them in an ashtray. He set fire to their edges with a lighter.

“You don't have to burn them. I'll remember.”

Damon stared at the burning papers. “I thought you might. Too bad.”

“Why did you do it?”

“Money.”

“Lyon figured out how it was done—something about radio-controlled airplanes. You've done something to Lyon.”

“They went for a ride in his balloon.”

Bea felt waves of nausea. She lunged across the kitchen toward the door and wrenched it open. Snow's arm curved around her neck and bent her backward. She kicked, and heard him grunt as her foot caught his shin. He shoved her onto the floor in the breakfast nook. She crawled to her feet and saw him in the archway, holding the automatic.

“I don't suppose it will help any to tell you that you can't get away with this?”

“I expected better of you, Beatrice.”

“What will you do with me?”

“There will be a phone call shortly—from the Coast Guard, I would imagine—and afterwards you will kill yourself in a state of deep sorrow.”

“I will not.”

“Don't be naïve.”

Robin had come through the open kitchen door and stood behind Damon with her mouth open.

“You don't imagine that I'm going to cooperate, do you?”

“You don't need to.”

Robin reached across the stove to the pegboard holding a multitude of pots and pans. She quietly removed a frying pan and with both hands brought it down on top of Damon Snow's head. The automatic clattered to the floor as he fell straight forward.

“Daddy always said iron skillets were better than Teflon,” Robin said as she stepped over Damon.

Lyon rode next to the driver in the first car, as Rocco tried to make himself comfortable in the back seat. They were followed by another Murphysville cruiser, a commandeered taxicab occupied by three coastguards-men, and two State Police cars that had been hurriedly summoned off the Interstate.

“A plan of attack?” Lyon asked as he turned to Rocco.

“At the top of your drive, one car will go around the side and cover the rear. We'll go toward the living room side, and two cars will park broadside in front. We'll have the place surrounded in seconds.”

“Seconds,” Lyon said as the cars screeched off the highway and up the winding drive. He snapped the shotgun from its brackets over the sun visor and pumped a shell into the chamber. The cruiser swerved off the drive onto the grass and rocked to a halt.

Lyon flung himself out the door in a full run toward the living room window. He held the shotgun over his head as he calculated his approach to the bushes, and at the last moment he leaped for the window and crashed through.

He landed in a shower of glass and wood splinters and somersaulted into a crouch, with the shotgun wavering before him.